


A Snowden Story

by Snowden



Category: Minecraft (Video Game)
Genre: Drama, F/F, F/M, Fantasy, Gen, M/M, Multi, Romance, Sex
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-10-24
Updated: 2019-01-08
Packaged: 2019-08-06 21:24:27
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death, Rape/Non-Con, Underage
Chapters: 15
Words: 25,923
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16395362
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Snowden/pseuds/Snowden
Summary: In the land of Luft which God made, twelve houses vie for power and prestige. Among the twelve, House Snowden has acquired a certain notorious reputation. Their sigil is the Hare, or Rabbit, and true to their nature they are a weak, naive, shy, and lowly house. Most damning of all, they are irredeemable perverts and nymphomaniacs. Most other houses shun or abuse them on this account, but one in particular has a special relationship, a kind of symbiotic bond between predator and prey. House Loft, of the Eagle, will stop at nothing to hunt down and "catch" their wayward wards.





	1. A Tale of Predator and Prey

**Author's Note:**

> This is one among a number of stories detailing the roleplay canon I have developed for Luft, a very large and expansive Minecraft project.  
> Please don't be dissuaded if nothing makes sense at first, most everything about how this world works will be explained eventually. This includes how this fits as a Minecraft fanfic.  
> I may link to a site where the Minecraft save can be downloaded if there is interest.  
> Also, FAIR WARNING: the Snowden family is made up of a special kind of sexual deviancy, some of which would be judged very harshly by modern real-world standards. I do not endorse any illegal behavior beyond the bounds of fiction, and urge those who are uncomfortable with such matters to NOT read this work.

Long ago, there lived in a castle in the sky a certain God and his children, which were twelve pairs of animals. One day, God returned from his labors and said to the children, “It is not finished, but it is good enough. This world I give to you, you sinful lot, and from my home I cast you out. Go, fill the earth with your children, prosper, fight, find joy and sorrow, and do all the things little creatures such as yourselves do. My servant will fill your lands with all the things you will need. When the sun is swallowed and darkness falls, I will come again to see what you have wrought. Now be gone.”

So the children dispersed to the corners of the land, and had their own children, and turn by turn raised their Houses in the dwellings God had built.

Now among the children there was a pair of hares who were weak of constitution and mind. During the dispersal they became lost in the snowy woods. They found no shelter and no food, and were close to death. The eagles, while soaring over their newfound domain, spotted the hares and swooped low.

“Ah, you look in great distress my siblings. Perhaps I should eat you, as it would be easy, we are hungry, and it would quickly put you out of your misery,” said the father eagle.

“No, please don’t! We do not want to die!” said the hares.

“What care I what you want? I have a mother eagle to feed, for she is expecting young.”

The hares knew that all pleas of mercy and morality would fall on deaf ears, for the eagles were proud, vain, and ever only thought of their own lot and station. But the mother hare was clever, and brave, and spoke up with argument.

“God above birthed us into this world. He made you to soar in the skies and lord over all the earth. You will be a great house, the greatest of them. Yet you are no greater than God. He that made us made us twelve kinds, not eleven. It would do him great disservice to wipe out one of his houses before it can ever fledge. When your children ascend and become lords, you will be lords over ten families, not eleven, and will be lesser for it, and lesser in the eyes of God. You that would be God’s regent, please do not corrupt his plan so early in its infancy.

I beg of you, spare us, and I will give to you some of my children, and their children, and their children’s children, ever after, and we will be the most subservient and pliable of your subjects.”

Mother hare’s plea appealed to the eagle, who had great pride and received words of elevation and self-submission very eagerly. So the eagle took the hares in its beak. He flew them to his nest, and meagerly raised them back to health. All the while the mother and father hare thanked him with great and sincere platitudes.

But when it came time to see them off, the eagle reminded the hares of their bargain. He said to them, “Your children and your children’s children, ever after, was your promise. I will come to you when you are brimming with young, and of them, I will have my fill. Do not renege, or I will wipe your family out, to the root.”

The hares bowed and made their leave, afraid not for themselves, but for the countless hares to come, and the crimes that might be committed upon them.

This then is their story.


	2. A Warren of Rabbits

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Coran Tur's Dream Lounge

Helen lay on her back, blouse up over her breasts, skirt pushed aside, and panties flitted across the bedding. Elliot was in the midst of humping her, and putting in a good effort. Nonetheless, Helen seemed disinterested. The harder the young man pounded, the grumpier and stiffer the young woman seemed to become. The reason for her discomfort was most likely the nearby spectator.

“Well how does it feel? Does it feel good? Say something! You’re not enjoying it, are you? I knew you wouldn’t. You’re very frigid, Helen. Come on, don’t be so stiff, relax and enjoy it! Elliot is trying his best. I bet it feels good but you’re just being spiteful.”

“Oh shut up! If I could concentrate, maybe, you know, if you weren’t staring at us like a creep!” Helen spat out, irritated.

Clair giggled. She lay on her belly, completely naked, head propped up on her elbows and staring intently at the copulating couple. To be accurate, her head was some six inches above Helen’s and staring almost directly into her eyes. Hearing Helen’s protest, she giggled, and then closed the small gap with her lips. Her tongue found its way inside the mouth of the other. Her hand reached out and found Helen’s clit. It began rubbing in rhythm with Elliot’s penis. Helen’s nerve gave out and she began succumbing to the pleasures in her groin.

“Ah! No! Ah! Ah!”

“Now does it feel good?” Clair asked with a smirk. Her forefinger wrapped around the boys shaft, and her thumb dug into the clit. Elliot rammed up and down with all the strength and speed his scrawny body could muster. Helen convulsed. Her orgasmic cry was suppressed by Clair’s renewed lip lock. The climax continued until Elliot exhausted himself on her. Spent, he flopped over onto the cushions to suck air.

The top girl released her kiss. The bottom girl reached up to continue it, but couldn’t lift her head high enough. She began whimpering. The former put a finger to the latter’s lips and pressed her head back into the pillow.

“You couldn’t even get Elliot to cum. It’s alright, it’s your first time and this is about you. But in the future, you’ve got to help him climax. Coitus is best when the orgasm goes both ways.” Clair finished her lecture with a peck to Helen’s lips. She then turned her lips onto Elliot’s dick and quickly sucked him off. His moan was much like Helen’s, high pitched, begging, and childlike.

“There, now you’re both good.”

“What about you?” Elliot asked in between pants.

“I can take care of myself,” Clair answered.

The trio burrowed into the blankets and began the customary post-coitus cuddling. Warm bodies pressed against one another. With the tower as cold as it was, it took all of them and all the covers to keep from shivering. Given the orgasms, two of them were shivering anyways. Clair wrestled her way to the top of the pile and clutched her lovers tightly to her breasts. The three lay there for a long while, basking in their consummated affection.

“That could have gone better,” Clair said aloud.

“I was too nervous,” Helen replied.

“Why?”

“Well, because it’s a guy.”

“That’s why?! Even after we practiced with the strap-on?”

“Do you see boobs here?” Helen prodded Elliot in his flat chest. “Boys don’t have boobs. It’s not the same. And you suck at humping. And it’s weird with three people. I can’t get used to it.”

“I don’t see any boobs here either,” Clair said while prodding Helen’s flat chest, “so what’s the big deal? I’m no good with the motions? Maybe _you_ should have been the one with the strap-on.”

“How is that supposed to help me practice for a real guy?”

“By pretending you’re a guy, you can put yourself in his place and empathize with his situation.”

“That doesn’t make any sense.”

“Sure it does! Elliot, you get it, right?”

The boy ducked his head under the covers. His reply was muffled and inaudible.

“Elliot! Stop hiding!” Clair ducked under the covers too. A muffled argument ensued, to which Helen was excluded. The interlopers reemerged.

“He says he doesn’t want to offend either of us, so he’s keeping silent and staying out of our fight.”

“You’re very considerate, Elliot. And _smart_.” Hellen trained her daggered eyes on her female lover.

“Still, you did seem to enjoy it, eventually. Maybe you just need an extra set of hands for the first few go arounds. Want to try again?”

“I can’t,” Elliot protested. “Tired,” he added.

“Fine fine!” Clair crawled out of the covers. She immediately regretted it. “Brrr! Give me one of those!” She snatched a blanket from the still-cuddling couple and wrapped it around herself. There was a knock at the entrance.

“Hide!” Clair ordered in a hush. Elliot and Helen threw the covers over their heads.

“Are you guys still in there?” came a voice.

“It’s just me,” Clair answered.

The veil separating the Dream Lounge from the hallway parted. A young man and woman walked through. They peered around, searching the lounge for its occupants.

“Where are they?” Lisa asked. Clair shrugged her shoulders. Nate had a sharper eye and went over to the suspicious bulge in the bedding. He took the corner and threw it back.

“Hi Nate,” Elliot said. Helen buried her reddened face in the pillow.

“Well?” Nate asked.

“I did it,” Helen said from beneath embarrassed hands.

“Good to hear,” Nate said. He reached down to caress the shy young woman. Elliot interceded, catching Nate’s hand in his own. The latter hesitated, then acquiesced. Their fingers interlocked. Elliot leaned up and gave Nate a loving kiss.

“It wasn’t easy. She needs more time one-on-one.”

“Understood.” Nate said this, but he couldn’t quite hide a tone of exasperation lodged in his voice.

Lisa kneeled beside them as well.

“Did you like it?” was her question.

“No.”

“She’s lying, she loved it.”

“Don’t speak for me!”

“She moaned and shook and everything. Bodies don’t lie.”

“Just because you can make me cum! Terrible.”

“Are you dressed?” Nate pulled the cover back further. Except for her undergarments, Helen was indeed clothed. Elliot as well, once his shorts were pulled up. The boy found the girl’s panties and handed them to her. She donned them, all the while still refusing to show her face.

“Your time’s up. There’s someone waiting to use the lounge. We have to go.”

“Okay.”

Elliot and Nate helped Helen to her feet. Clair pranced around looking for her numerous articles of clothing. Lisa tidied up the bedding and couch cushions. A minute, and the quintet was recovered and ready. They gazed about the room.

“It’s a nice place to do this,” Clair noted. “Better than the Erotic Arts Studio. More room. I like all the couches and beds. You could have a proper pillow fight in here.”

“Can these curtains support my weight?” Lisa asked, tugging on one of the many drapes hung across the ceiling and walls. It yielded, revealing the bay window looking out onto the central chamber. “It doesn’t completely cover the window. Someone could have been watching us,” she noted.

“Exhibitionism your thing, huh?” Clair needled.

“No. Not at all! Definitely not! Absolutely not!”

Clair eyed Lisa suspiciously.

“Too bad. I’d like to try it.”

“Clair you’re such a pervert!”

“Oh please. The only innocent one here is the baby.”

“Are you done?” Nate asked sharply. The girls squeaked. A bell rung, signaling the end of their reservation. They exited the lounge all too quickly, and found themselves stumbling straight into the next set of reservations.

“Ah!”

“Ouch! Ooof! Oh no! We’re so-” and Clair’s voice died on taking in the offended party.

An elderly man and woman stood stone still. The man towered above all of them, even Nate, by a full two heads. The lady, in comparison, was a runt who could barely reach Helen’s shoulders. They were richly dressed, in satin coats and cloaks overlying dress suit and witch dress, respectively. If there was any doubt as to their identity, the lady’s necklace dispelled it. A jewel, in the shape of a pale crescent moon and intricately entwined with violet-gold filigree, hung at her bosom.

“Lady Moonmage! My sincere apologies! We had no intention of keeping you waiting!” Nate enacted a deep, waist-low bow. It was low enough for the lady to easily give him a knock upon the crown with her knuckles. It hurt, but Nate didn’t dare flinch. The other youth joined him in submissive gestures.

To the uninformed, it looked like a group of teenagers giving respect to their seniors.

To a mind-reader, this one-same thought could be heard coursing through each of their brains:

‘ _Please don’t turn me into a toad! Please don’t turn me into a toad! Please don’t turn me into a toad! Please don’t turn me into a toad! Please don’t turn me into a toad!_ ’

The elderly lady brushed past the youth and into the lounge. The kids sighed in relief.

“Not toads,” the lady said gruffly as she disappeared. “Rabbits. Next time, be out on time.”

The kids stood ramrod straight, stiff in fright. The elderly man moved to join his companion. Before he did, however, he addressed Nate.

“Your Lady asked me to pass along a message. You should go to her directly once you are finished. She is waiting in her studio.”

“Yes sir. We are humbled and thankful for your consideration, Sir Moonmage sir,” Nate said.

Lady Moonmage’s husband nodded. He reached up, removed a white scarf from a hook, and replaced it with a scarf of blue and silver. He gave the white scarf to Nate. This was the token of reservation, to show if and who occupied the Dream Lounge at a given moment. As the elder left to join his wife, he wiped the hand that had touched the scarf, giving off a wry frown as he did so. Elliot and Clair smirked, half in amusement, half in embarrassment.

“It’s not funny,” Nate warned.

“The leader of the tower, the lady of House Moonmage, _the most powerful mortal in the entire south!_ is about to go to sleep in the middle of our love funk,” Clair quietly, giddily exclaimed.

“It was pretty smelly,” Lisa noted. “As if it wasn’t obvious enough what we do in there.”

Elliot nodded along.

“They see a white scarf there, it must drive them crazy.”

Even Helen could not repress a smile. Laughter would soon follow.

“You idiots. It’s not crazy so much as barely contained outrage.”

Nate could be a real killjoy. Naturally, as the eldest he was the leader of their little warren. They would have all been turned into toads- or rather, rabbits- long ago if not for his maturity and level-headedness. His attitude was annoying, but the others knew it was for their own good. He stood over them, looking down on each of them sternly.

“Don’t you dare say such things to Lady Moonmage. Don’t even think them.”

“It can’t be helped,” Elliot said. “We are Snowdens after all.”

The quintet bowed their heads.

As if that old statement of fact justified and explained everything that transpired. Shameful, truly.

“Lady Snowden is waiting,” Lisa reminded them. They scurried off in single file.

 


	3. Mother Hare

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Coran Tur (northeast face)

-Coran Tur, Tower of Sloth

For a castle built to shelter and sustain those most given over to the sin of slack and laziness, it sure was a massive pain to navigate. Four towers sprung from the central keep, and each was interconnected with the keep and with each other by means of a complex web of corridors. Ah, and the joke is that I used the word “corridor”, which implies some flat, level walkway from one definitive point to another. Ha! No. The overwhelming majority of connections were of the stairway variety, and of _those_ , most were of the steep, forty-five degree incline sub-variety. To say little of the double-backs, landing-wells, turrets, and half-drops that turned the simplest of traversals into winding labyrinthine jaunts. Elevation is a way of life for the residents of Coran Tur.

For a young and healthy adult, this would normally present little trouble. For a trio coming off vigorous physical exercise and traveling from the ground level to one third up the second tallest tower, and then two thirds the height of the tallest tower, it was beyond grueling.

“Sorry. Sorry.” Elliot collapsed on the steps.

“We’re almost there.” Nate propped Elliot up onto his shoulder and basically carried him up the final flight of stairs. They called this tower “Savant’s Spire”, a reference to the mad artists who would lock themselves away for days or weeks on end, never coming down to mingle with regular society. Nate suspected their prolonged absences had more to do with the long, arduous trek up and down the spire. The worst of it was the stair-bridge connecting Savant’s Spire with the Residential Tower, a longsome span completely exposed to the outdoor elements. Why anyone would prefer these quarters was a psychological question delving into the mind of the recluse; why the matriarch of their house, a necessarily social position, would make a point of staying up here was a guess at madness.

Nate was one of the strongest men in their house, but that only made him average by any other house’s standards. They reached a landing and doorway, whereupon he deposited Elliot on the floor and then joined him there. Helen and Clair were quite winded as well. Lisa was the only one in good spirits. While the others rested she took a peep inside the door. A few whispered words of inquiry and instructions were passed back and forth.

“She says we may come in whenever.”

Nate took several deep, slow breaths.

Helen tucked herself into a tight ball. Clair and Elliot fought through their exhaustion to hug her.

“It’ll be alright.”

“You did what you were supposed to do.”

“We’re here for you.”

They cooed words of support and care into her ear. It didn’t seem to help. Beyond the exhaustion, the little woman looked scared.

“I love you, no matter what happens.”

It took some minutes to catch their breaths. Nate spent the time to wonder about the lady’s choice of abode. The long climb seemed purposeful to him- a way to exhaust visitors and put them at a physical disadvantage. If so, it worked.

“Pull yourselves together,” he said aloud. They all struggled to their feet, not quite as rested as they needed to be. Nate approached the door with the sign “Creative Writing” displayed upon it. He pushed it in, waited for permission to enter, received it, did so, and then the rest filed in after.

“You all must be tired. You _are_ tired. Please, take a seat.”

Grateful youth sat themselves on the nearest object that could be construed as a seat. For Elliot and Helen, that was actual chairs, for Lisa, a stepladder, and for Nate and Clair, book cases. There were plenty of the last. Savant’s Spire is the tallest tower in Coran Tur, but also the skinniest. The Creative Writing department was a cramped library of sorts that quickly filled out its allotted space, and then expanded vertically in order to keep growing. The air above them was packed with stacks and stacks of odd bookshelves, interwoven with haphazard catwalks, stair steps, and inset ladders. Natural light somehow made it through that maze and fell upon a table taking up half the base floor space. It was at this table, surrounded by books and loose sheaves of paper, that the Lady Snowden made her office.

Aria Snowden was beautiful, by anyone’s standards, let alone familial tastes. Her skin was fair and lush, her hair gleamed an ethereal white, her face was small, well-defined, and unblemished. Her frame was narrow and lithe, devoid of fat, a ballerina’s body, girlish in nature with subtle curves, taller than average for a female hare. It all looked so unnaturally young and childish too, that the only hint of her great age was the wrinkles around her eyes. Hers was a typical Snowden form, but raised to its perfection, or thusly an epitomic Snowden form.

Her clothing was formal and of prototypical Snowden style. She wore a saffron-hued, flowing, backless dress, the narrow front riding up to a choker and adorned with a bow, the back ridge riding very steeply down to nearly her buttocks, and the hem ending in elegant pleated folds fairly high on her thigh. The saffron was accentuated by cream white accessories- opera-length gloves, thigh-high stockings, and bow-tied sash. The whole assemble was beautiful in itself, and exquisite when adorning Aria’s perfect figure. Four of the children blushed in envy and admiration.

The Lady had been working on writings. When all were situated, she set down her pencil and reached out to Helen. The poor girl held her breath as the linen-bound fingers caressed her cheek.

“Helen, how old are you?” the matriarch asked.

“Sixteen, as of yesterday,” Helen answered dutifully.

“Is it done?”

“Yes.”

“Did you climax?”

“Yes.”

“Did he climax?”

“No.”

Aria’s noble face twisted into a motherly frown. Disappointment hung heavy in her eyes. It would have been easy to lie, but the consequences for being found out would be much worse.

Clair held up her hand, wishing to speak.

“Yes Clair?”

“May I put a word in?”

“You may.”

“Helen was so nervous, it was everything in our power just to get her to relax and concentrate on herself. You can’t expect her to master the art of pleasuring when she is a novice at being pleasured, in a heterosexual context. Besides, isn’t the expectation that the man can see to his own climax?”

Aria motioned for Clair to cease argument.

“Sixteen years of age, and you are just now losing your virginity. An aberration, by our standards. Why has it taken so long, Helen?”

“I can’t say,” Helen answered.

“Do you prefer women, is that it?”

“I wouldn’t call it a preference. I’m more comfortable with girls, because I’m a girl. If that makes sense.”

“Do you dislike men?”

“No.”

“Do you feel uncomfortable around men, sexually?”

“No. Well, yes, but it’s because it’s new to me.”

“Clair.” The girl had raised her hand once more. Aria eyed her; she didn’t back down and kept her hand aloft. “What is it?”

“I don’t think it’s fair for Helen to be judged by her age. I think she is a late bloomer, but I think we can work with it. If you had given us more time, we had planned more sessions, to get her used to this kind of thing.”

The elderly lady massaged her brow and sighed in frustration.

“Clair, be quiet. No more interruptions.”

“Yes ma’m.”

“Helen.”

“Yes?”

“Is what Clair said true?”

Helen nervously looked over to her companion.

“Um. Yes. If you gave me more time, I could be like everyone else. I’m not opposed to it. If that’s okay. Please?” Helen shakily clasped her hands together in a sign of prayer.

Aria stared her down.

“Time is the one thing you don’t have,” she said sternly.

Helen sniffled.

“I don’t understand. Am I that strange? Is it wrong, wanting to wait?”

“Is it wrong? Not at all. I was eighteen when I lost my virginity. I was not judged for doing so. Snowdens are deviants by nature, and to deviate from deviation would make you... _normal_. Who are we to judge? We would be eviscerated for such hypocrisy. And yet...”

Aria rose from her seat and went to a bookshelf. She retrieved from it a picture in spruce wooden frame. She set the picture down before Helen for her to see. The girl and the others took in its subject, recognition slowly dawning.

“Do you recognize that person?”

“I think so.”

“There has been an incident. I apologize, sincerely, but circumstances require that your sexual maturation be completed. By this evening.”

“Ah! But that’s... too sudden...”

“What happened?” Nate asked unbidden.

Lady Snowden’s face twisted in anger. Not at Nate’s inquiry, but from memories it drew forth.

 


	4. Tea and Politics

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Coran Tur's Central Chamber

Two stately ladies, much advanced in age although you would never tell it from their looks (noble blood has a way of doing that), met for tea by the main chamber’s self-serve cafe. The one was a runt, the other a ghost. Indeed, these were two women of previous mention, the Lady Moonmage and the Lady Snowden, matriarchs and leaders of their respective houses. These meetings were fairly routine, as the two were close friends. Aria Snowden did not anticipate official business being conducted on this occasion, so that she was blindsided by Ilia Moonmage’s turn of conversation.

“Pardon me?” Aria said in shock.

“You’re taking up space. Too much space. We need the beds for ourselves. You’ll have to kick some members out. Is anyone close to dying? Don’t reclaim the bed. I know that’s hard for you bunnies.”

Aria stared agape. She remembered when Ilia was much younger, kinder, and eloquent in voice. Taller too. There was some kind of curse on the position of the Moonmage Matriarch- it turned every woman who attained that title into a grumpy, short-tempered, stocky little hag. She saw the curse take its course on Ilia’s body, but she never imagined it would affect her mind so wholly, and yet here they were.

“You can’t expect us to give up our beds!”

“Why not? It’s not your tower. You’re not Moonmage. You’re not Sloth. You’re guests, visitors, squatters at this point. We’ve got mothers and fathers wanting chicks, and we need those chicks, for jobs and labor and research that you stupid weak bunnies can’t fulfill.” Ilia slurped at her tea.

“Beds can’t be just handed over. The Law of Beds- what would you do?” Aria rose to her feet. “Would you have us executed?!”

“Switch your beds with criminals, execute the criminals, viola.”

“There aren’t enough condemned inmates, not in the numbers you’re talking about- and even still, you would have us live in the prison? Ilia, you must be joking!” Aria slammed her hands down on the table.

Ilia stared at her friend with stone cold eyes. Then a snort punched its way out of her nostrils, then giggles, then a fit of unbridled mirth roared out. Aria gawked at the woman, helpless and hopelessly befuddled.

“You! You you you! You stupid silly bunny! Seriously- send you all to the mines? Ha ha ha! You’d fry in minutes! Execute all the criminals? What are we, monsters?” Ilia suddenly straightened up and resumed an incredibly serious expression. “I’m not kidding around. The Council has legit peeves about your occupancy. They’re talking renegotiations. Long term, of course, wouldn’t kill you or anything uncivil like that.”

Aria was relieved, but only by so much. It was difficult dealing with Ilia on a professional basis, she tended to mix wild hyperbole with serious propositions.

“Ilia, this is terrible. Snowden is already the smallest house. We have less than a fifth of the tower’s beds, if you take any more- we’ll crumble.”

“I know, I know, you’re in a pretty bad situation, aren’t you? Sorry to take advantage of it. Oops!” Ilia covered her mouth like she had divulged a secret.

“What do you mean, take advantage of us?” Aria demanded.

Ilia stirred her tea and took dainty little sips.

“It’s too bitter.”

“Ilia!”

“Fine. The point: just needed to give you a little nudge, reminder of your position in this tower. You wouldn’t have anything if not for us. Maybe that little Silren Village, but that’s a backwoods. Don’t bother with the “ _We’re so grateful!_ ” and “ _We understand!_ ” and “ _We’d do anything for you!_ ”. On second thought, I want to hear it from your lips. That last one.”

“We would do anything for you,” Aria said. She meant it, but lacked any enthusiasm or gratitude in being forced to say it.

“Good. You understand. It’s a roundabout way of saying we discovered a nice trading opportunity up north, but it requires your services, and you definitely won’t like it. At all. So I had to bring up that spiel to get you to agree to work the deal for us. You’re getting a mite comfy in those beds, time you worked for them.”

Aria slowly lowered herself into her seat. The implications of Ilia’s words were dawning on her. Anger was replaced by fear.

“By north, you don’t mean...”

“Triss. Thill. The ones in charge thereof. Yeah, them.”

“Why us?” Aria asked.

“Because bunnies have exactly one talent that could be considered useful to civilization at large.”

“Tailoring?” she guessed.

“Correct. God just plopped down a new loom in Thill. Puppies don’t know the first thing about weaving or sewing, so they went snooping around for someone to do it for them. They’re offering up a good deal to whoever can run their cloth shop. My kids _really_ want those new redstone handy gadgets. They say it makes the Clefton machine look slow and dumb as a beardy bear. _Think of the research! The magic development! The workload efficiency! The entertainment applications!_ That’s what they’re chirping on about nonstop to me.”

Aria nodded in understanding.

“So it’s a trade deal, our tailoring expertise for their redstone products.”

“Basically. It’s more complicated than that, duty-fee waivers arranged through the Cherry Blossom Society, that kind of legalese you don’t like. But basically.”

Aria lowered her gaze.

“It’s not the little details that makes this really complicated though, is it?”

Ilia got up and went up to Aria. She patted her friend on the back (the lower back, the limit of her midget-sized reach) in consolation. Her crackly voice softened.

“I know it’s hard. I wouldn’t put this on you if it was just up to me.”

“The council, right.”

“They want better relations with Centerpoint. Can’t do that if they’re at war with Triss.”

“And the Endingways answer to Triss, so they think this deal will get on their good side.”

“Yep.”

Ilia took Aria’s tea and tasted it.

“Sweet. I knew it. You bunnies love it sweet. How the hell do you keep so skinny with all that sugar?”

Her attempt at levity had no effect. She puffed out a sigh.

“Sorry. North-south politics are a drag. Hate to drag you into this. It’ll be all right. You’ll need someone to go north and work out the details.”

“I’ll go myself,” Aria said.

“Eh. Well, I won’t make you go alone. Send some otters with you. Everyone loves a Basilton.”

Aria smiled, a little. That was true.

“Colty has all the arrangements for you. Boat to Gold Sand, high road to Cherry Blossom HQ and then overland to the warp gate. They say there’s a bit of a monster infestation in the area, so don’t think of going off road.”

“Very well.”

Aria hung her head. Her pale hair hung lower, encircling the face of her friend. Ilia reached a grubby finger up and rubbed her cheek.

“Ever been to Triss?” she asked. Aria shook her head in the negative. “You’re in for a treat. Try to have a little fun, sightsee. And be careful. Send me a hoot hoot if you get in trouble.”

Ilia took her remaining tea as well as Aria’s tea and set off.

“You damn owl,” Aria muttered under her breath.


	5. To Suffer a Fool

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Castle Triss, Tower of Pride

The Law of Buildings.

Aria was bitterly reminded of the second of the Sacred Tenants that bound all mortals to the will of God.

“Any structure that God creates will remain forever. Any structure that Man creates will crumble overnight,” she recited.

Why did God envy their meager efforts, and insist on personally constructing every little house and road and fence, when he could be working on wonders such as _this_. It baffled the mind.

The Lady looked out over the gardens far below. They were rich, intricate, and exacting. Trimmed bushes were fashioned into mazes, hedged between marble arches and granite pathways. Geometric waterways wound between planters full of royal dominae flowers. The Cardinal’s Tower, a majesty of quartz marble architecture, rose above the hedge maze. A low wall encircled it all and protected it from the misty white ocean beyond.

The quality of the castle’s architecture was not new to her. After all, her home was Coran Tur. Of all of God’s endeavors, the greatest were the Seven Towers of Sin, and the Tower of Pride and the Tower of Sloth were of equal grandeur. The love and pride that went into their construction was evident in their size, in their diversity of purpose, in their decoration and architectural intricacy. She was appreciative but not amazed at the castle’s beauty.

What had Aria irritated, and indeed what had her jaw hung slack in astonishment, was the aforementioned ocean. That sea of white mist? Those were _clouds_.

Castle Triss, Tower of Pride, floated serenely in the upper atmosphere. It was suspended there, held up by no tangible support or force. It was indeed, a “Castle in the Sky”.

“Breathtaking, isn’t it?”

Aria turned.

A man approached. He had a roguish face and a huntsman’s body, red-flecked hair that streamed over his shoulders, sharp eyes, sharp nose, sharp teeth, and a disarming smile. He wore a fur-trimmed coat dyed in crimson red, with vermillion designs imprinted all over it, mainly of stylized weapons of war. His name was Gideon Foust, and he and Aria had come to know one another a little bit over the course of her visit.

“I didn’t think it would bother me this much. There’s nothing beneath us,” she answered him.

“Just air. It still amazes me. God is full of imagination and miracles. Too bad for the cloud cover. You can see clear from Gold Sand to Redstone on a good clear day. If you try really hard, you can make out the spikes of Mamalukrond on the horizon.” He situated himself beside her at the window.

They were in the Councilor’s Chamber of the Bishop’s Tower, one of the seven that comprised the full Tower of Pride. A conference between all involved parties had just been concluded an hour before. Progress was good, a deal was in sight, and the only real obstacle was the conflicted feelings of the two primary parties. Gideon had offered his services as an intermediary to Aria. As the nephew of Lord Foust and the chief of his house’s logistics business, he held considerable sway in the proceedings. Also in his favor, the Fousts were considered neutral relative to the issue at hand and could be trusted to be unbiased (or biased towards their own selves, at least).

“You’re beautifully dressed. Alluring, even. I heard Snowden had a tasteless sense of fashion, but going by your example I would find the opposite is true.” Aria wore her winter suit, on account of the high atmosphere’s wind chill. It was made up of a black bodysuit covering her from neck to fingertip to toe, with asymmetric silver and azure stripes inlaid to accentuate her natural curves. Short-top boots and a snow-white poncho with Snowden patterns emblazoned around the trim completed the outfit.

“Thank you for the compliment,” Aria replied.

“Is this what we can expect from your kind, when the Thillian loom is all set and running?”

Aria looked over her apparel.

“The body stocking, yes. The poncho is of my own design, for myself. We will of course bring the upmost quality to the process, but the fashion will still be Endingway style.”

“The dogs. A pity. It looks comfortable.”

“It’s very comfortable, for the weather.”

“Is it easy to get on and off?”

“Yes. It’s quite stretchy.”

“Is it? Let me feel.”

Aria hesitantly held out her arm. Gideon took her wrist and tugged at the fabric. It stretched out as advertised. When released, it snapped back in place. There was not a single wrinkle or patch of slack anywhere on Aria’s body. Gideon prolonged his investigation of the fabric for a few seconds more- long enough that Aria wondered if it weren’t really an investigation of her wrist and hand. She withdrew. Gideon put on a wide, beaming smile.

“I like it. What is the material?”

“Mageweave. It’s a fern that grows in the southern mountains.”

“I see. I’ve never been to the south.”

“Do you live here?” Aria asked.

“No, no. Not so fortunate. I’m in Gold Sand River.”

“Gold Sand? That’s not exactly Foust territory.”

“No it isn’t, but we still have a large presence there. I mean, who doesn’t?” Gideon said with a chuckle.

“Not us,” Aria replied.

“Really? One hundred and sixty beds, and none belong to Snowden?” he asked with bemusement.

“Not one,” Aria answered.

“Huh. Strange.”

 _Strange is that you think any Snowden could possibly live north of the Zabrael road_ , Aria thought.

“It’s a shame, really. I’ve met a few Snowden a while back, in Tigbar. Really enjoyed their company. You do live up to your reputation.” He gave her a wink and a knowing smile. “I had the next room over at the inn. They sounded like they were having fun. So much laughing.”

“That does sound like us,” she admitted.

“The openness. The unashamed and unabashed nature of it. I’m fascinated by your attitude towards it. Nothing like my kind.” Gideon rolled his eyes. “Foxes are back-bitey little drama whores, all the way through. It’s a messy waltz, one two three, one two three, slap slap kiss, slap slap kiss. Even worse for one in my position. The salary and title attracts the worst kind of drama. The moment I show any inkling of favor towards one lady, the others turn rampant on her. The noise! Oh God, the noises they can make! Yipping is not a metaphor, it’s quite literal!”

Aria caught herself following the man’s facial expression, which varied wildly with each word. It was mere fascination with an eccentric character, but Gideon noticed it. He turned on her and began speaking in earnest.

“I know us northerners hold your kind in low esteem, but to be frank, I think they’re all a bunch of dried up jelly beans. I envy you Snowdens.”

“There is nothing to be envious of,” Aria reassured him.

“I admit, I’m a bit fuzzy on the subject of sexual preference with you all. Boys loving boys and girls loving girls, yes that is unnatural but not egregious and I think a perfectly valid choice. But to have it both ways, to love boys _and_ girls, it’s a bit beyond me how that happens. Is it cultural? Or genetic?”

“Both, but don’t ask me to explain, we don’t have enough time.”

“I have lots of time! And an eagerness to learn. Please, my dear, educate me.”

“No, I think I’ll be going.”

Aria made to leave.

Gideon interceded.

“On chance, are you not feeling well?” he asked.

“That’s right,” Aria answered.

“Then allow me to help you feel better. I can work wonders with my hands. And look, they left the drinks. I’m handy with concoctions. Ones that sooth, and enliven, and bring out the spirit, I can make such elixirs with the barest ingredients.”

“I don’t really drink,” Aria said. Gideon shrugged and grabbed a glass for himself. He took a wine bottle and filled the glass to the brim. This he offered to Aria.

“I don’t _ever_ drink,” Aria clarified, with vehemence.

“Shame. You sure? First time for everything.”

Aria pushed the proffered wine back. Gideon put the glass to his lips. One swill, and half of it was gone. A loud exhalation followed. Pungent breath reached Aria’s nose.

“That’s weird. Very weird! How can you be so cavalier going about it and never drinking? Is that a rabbit thing? Or just you? Do you not need the blood iron?”

“Excuse me.” Aria tried pushing past him. The man would not get out of her way. He seemed to stumble and trip in the exact sequence that perfectly blocked off her polite attempt to bypass him.

“Now dear. Dear dear.” He finished off the wine glass and put it aside. Aria stood stiff as he rummaged close to her. The next moment, he had fallen against her. His hands were on her shoulders, and his face was close to her chest.

“Maybe I haven’t been perfectly honest and straight forward. I imagine that’s a disqualifying trait in your eyes. After all, it must be strange, for me to be babbling about the bush like this. Since your kind is so easy and open, flirting must be a lost art- or one never acquired? No, I’m being rude, forgive me. An unnecessary art, a superfluous act, that is what flirting is to you. Then I should say it simply, I want to fuck you.”

Aria stepped back and slapped Gideon across the face. It stung, but otherwise did not deter him.

“I know this game. It’s called ‘tsundere’ isn’t it? We roleplay like we hate each other, but in reality the fuck is a few bruises away. Vixens love this game.”

Aria shuddered with rage. “No. You’re wrong. I have _no_ interest in having sex with you. Do not touch me.”

“But... what?!”

Gideon’s body deflated like a wet noodle. He made no more attempts to advance on Aria, but seemed lost, confused, and intent on arguing.

“Madam, I can’t think of anything I’ve done to deserve this! It’s terribly faulty. Why reject me? You’re a bunny! Bunnies fuck! That’s all well-known! That’s what you’re for! What God made you- your purpose in life- is easy nights for lovelorn bachelors, cold-cucked by their own fems. Don’t tell me I’m wrong, this is ageless knowledge!”

“You’re so wrong, you’re an idiot,” Aria replied.

“No!”

Gideon pounded a fist down on the table. He then turned an accusing finger on Aria.

“I know enough about history. Don’t you deny me. You lot were cast out of the north for being sex-crazed maniacs. You’d gobble up every bed in Thill if they let you. Butches and dykes, men in girl’s skirts, shagging in full public view, filling the streets with your rank, fucking the livestock, piss and wanning over each other’s faces, playing innies and outies with the holes, drugged up orgies at all hours, women raping the men with fake cocks, and on and on and on, every grotesque deviancy imaginable! That’s you! That’s Snowden!”

Aria winced. The accusations shot through her heart. There was enough truth in that diatribe to truly make it hurt.

“And you’re telling me, you of the nymphomania, that you don’t want me to touch you?! I, with more muscle than any of your thin-dicked boys could ever hope to achieve, who could show you the side of sex you’d never get in your own home, yes, _I_ am not good enough for you. What a load of deer cock.”

Gideon advanced on Aria, still spewing his tirade.

“What kind of bunny are you, to turn down easy sex? You’re the damn damsel of the whole house, you should be setting an example!”

“How could you be so ignorant of us!” Aria shouted.

“Ignorant? Me?” The accusation managed to momentarily halt Gideon’s advance. “How am I ignorant? Well I may be a mess at the moment, thanks to you, you unkind bitch, but I dare say I’m not ignorant. I know you have enemies here-”

“Right here in front of me,” Aria interjected.

“-and resources you could use, service I could provide. Even with all that justified discrimination, you lot survived. You did so using the only thing you really had going for you- your bodies. So if you just don’t like me, I don’t give a fuck, I’ll take it and you’ll give it for the same reason your family has always given it.”

“No,” Aria said.

“What do you want?”

“Nothing,” Aria answered.

“Oh, free then?”

“I’m not having sex with you!”

“Then what’s your price? Doesn’t have to be money. I can make this trade deal so much sweeter for you southerners. Just show me your flower. It’s what Snowdens have always offered to the other houses to survive. Think of this like that. A means to survive.”

Gideon took one step towards Aria, who backed away. He reached out, holding out an upturned palm.

 _Boom!_ The sound of heavy spruce doors flying open rang upon their ears. Heavy footsteps, impossibly fast, bore across the chamber. By the time Gideon turned to look his arm had already been caught and twisted behind his back. He was flung clear across the room, ten meters far, to the doorway itself. The fool scrambled to his feet, nursing his injured arm.

“The hell?!”

“Your history is lacking,” came a deep, solemn voice. “In ancient times the Snowdens _did_ prostitute themselves for protection and food. But they only ever did it for _one_ house, and it was not yours.”

Gideon stood enraged, but silent.

Aria stood in shock and fear.

The figure now separating them was tall, lanky, and filled with wrath. Lightning was in his eyes, and thunder in his voice. This was not so much a man as an omen, a portent of a future where _you do not exist_.

“Gideon. Get out of this tower. Don’t show your face here ever again.” The voice was low and steady, not so much the crack of a lightning bolt but the peel of a far off storm.

Gideon, drunk as he was, had the nerve to step forward, right up to the face of the monolithic man. He was overtopped by a foot and had to tilt his head up to speak.

“Sir. With all due respect, you don’t control me.”

One hand clenched into a fist.

“Oh, don’t do that. I’ll be going, save you the trouble of a murder trial. But before I go, I want you to know: I’ll remember this. _We_ will remember this. Someday, some far away day, when your pride is brought low and your house is in tatters, when you suffer in the midst of your most desperate hour, you’ll come to us asking for help, and the Foust will say ‘No’.”

Gideon strutted backwards and departed.


	6. In the Eagle's Claws

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Castle Triss's Council Chamber (Bishop's Tower)

The Councilor’s Chamber fell silent as a moonless night after the passage of a great storm. Aria was frozen in place. She dared not move for the longest time, waiting for some signal or sign to know it was okay to act. None came. It went on so long that another fear gripped her, that such a sign had already gone into effect and that she was offending the man with her continued presence.

“My apologies. I’ll be gone as well,” Aria said in low, subservient voice.

“One moment,” the man ordered.

Aria halted. She dared one nervous glance at her savior.

“Lord Loft?” she spoke.

He was tall. Thin. Thinness that belied inhuman strength. Beneath plain slacks and shirt there were muscles taut as steel. His hands, once unclenched from fists, resembled the claws of a raptor. His shoulders sloped, perhaps from decades of slouching and bending over to deal with low people and low affairs. His face was gaunt and severe. His hair was grey like ash, receding, cut very short, and unkempt. Wrinkle lines underscored deep set eyes. Piercing blue eyes, orbs that could cut through you body and soul. Literally, if the rumors were true.

The man and woman were not dissimilar in form. Yet, if both were thin, waifish sticks, she was a reed of wheat flexing in the wind, and he an unyielding titanium blade. The base material could hardly be more different.

“Thank you for saving me, Lord,” Aria said (notice, a Lady of a House called this man ‘Lord’). “Despite our reputation, we hares do have a sense of common decency, and a limit to our perversions. I would not want to give my body to a cretin like him, so I am glad to receive your intervention.”

“You can thank me by not patronizing me.”

“Apologies, my Lord.”

“You’re the head of a great house. Why are you calling me Lord?”

“Force of fear,” Aria admitted. There was something about overwhelming power that elicited honesty.

“You don’t need to be afraid of me. Only scum like that fox.”

‘ _Did he mean I should be afraid of the fox? Or the fox should be afraid of him?’_ Aria wondered. Though it didn’t matter, both suppositions were true.

“Allow me to be deferential. On account of your seniority.”

“Fine.” The man nodded.

“And also allow me to be gracious.” She held out one tentative hand. Her fingertips curled under the sleeve of the man’s shirt. He sensed the slight tug and instantly ripped the arm away.

“What do you think you’re doing?” he demanded.

Aria looked him earnestly in the eye.

“Paying you back.”

He glared down upon her.

“For putting scum in its place?”

“For saving me from rape.”

“Unnecessary.”

“Then, why did you ask me to stay?”

She was shaking.The man could no longer stand looking at the puddle of a woman before him. He went to gaze out of the bay window.

“It’s been near one hundred and fifty years since the Snowden ran away. Is that so long a time that you forget all propriety?”

Aria wracked her brain for what he might be referring to. She could not remember.

“I’m afraid so.”

 “Do you still trade sex for favors down there?”

“No, not really. The owls are basically asexual. The otters are too nice, and the snakes think we’re too ugly.”

“It must be hard then. Bereft of all income. Existing on other’s pity.”

“We’re not completely bereft. We have some skills. The reason I’m here, namely, making clothes.”

She noted the make of his slacks and long-sleeved shirt: the work was crisp and clean, and the fabric was quite good, but the craftsmanship was very basic and lacked all artistry. His house was not known for its appreciation of fashion.

“Sewing and cutting. Easy enough for wife-work.” He sucked in air through his lips. “Some idiots will pay money for that, I suppose.”

“This is what we have to offer. If you don’t want me, and you don’t care for our clothing, we’re useless to you. I don’t even get why you would save me. Or why you agreed to this trade deal. Or why you’re being such a pain about negotiating it. Make up your mind. Are we nothing to you? Or your sex slaves?”

She had the audacity to barely raise her voice to him. This was a mistake.

“You made a pact. You broke that pact. This is a matter of pride, and reclaiming that pride. A pithy fuck for a pithy intervention is beneath me. I am a married man, I could not accept your body in payment. Even back then, it was only ever our bachelors that made use of your services. You should be aware of this.”

Aria sensed the danger. There would be a price for this incident. The cost would be more than she alone could pay. She prayed it would not spiral out of control. That it would be limited to her generation, and not all future generations of her house.

Lord Loft saw that the Lady was sufficiently cowed. He began speaking down upon her bowed head, listing terms.

“I will allow the loom deal to go through. You will send your best tailors to Thill. We will provide them lodging and per diem. I expect adults, not children, with commensurate maturity and work ethic. They had better be on their best behavior. None of that homosexual faggotry. No fetishes. No adultery, man and woman pairs only. Or singles, if such a thing even exists for you lot. The Endingways will try to have their way with you, but I expect absolute abstinence with regards to Loft individuals. Is that clear?”

“Very clear,” Aria replied.

“I have a lot to deal with now, thanks to you. That vixen spawn cannot be allowed...” He began muttering under his breath while walking out the door.

Aria watched him leave, and then sighed in great relief. She bowed her head, squeezed her eyes shut, and began praying.

“Oh God. Oh God. Please. We need Sakura. This cannot last. They’ll rape us all, they’ll kill us all. We need our tower.”

Then she felt a presence over her shoulder. A hard hand weighed down on the small of her neck. She felt the aura of a predator looming over her backside, danger intimately close. Loft’s voice whispered into her ear.

“Send a young girl to my home. Someone with experience. My son is lonely.”

The presence lifted as swiftly as it descended.

A mother hare shivered in fear, fear of the eagle that had clutched her in his claws- but had decided that no, today he was not hungry.


	7. Our Burden, Now Yours

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Coran Tur's Creative Writing Library/Studio

“Do you recognize that person?”

“I think so.”

“There has been an incident. I apologize, sincerely, but circumstances require that your sexual maturation be completed. By this evening.”

“Ah! But that’s... too sudden...”

“What happened?” Nate asked unbidden.

Aria shook in rage. She could still vividly remember the pressure on the back of her neck.

“That person, tell me who he is,” she demanded.

Nate picked up the picture, thumbing its image.

“It’s Lord Constantine Loft, head of House Loft.”

“And his rank?”

“Number two.”

“Number two in personal strength or societal influence?” Aria asked.

“I don’t know.”

“It’s a trick question. The answer is both. He is Spokesperson for the Council of Pride, which overseas Castle Triss and has de-facto power over the entire northern region. Houses Stonestep, Beckben, Pilate, and Endingway all swear allegiance to him. The mayors of Thill and Redstone Arsenal follow his leadership. In combat, he is one of three living mortals to have a confirmed tier three monster kill. His skill with bow and spear are unmatched. In virtually every measure of ‘power’, he is inferior only to King Felric himself.”

A hushed silence fell over the children. That their Lady, a noble of high station herself, would rant on of the accolades of this lord was more than enough to impress them. To mention this man in the same breath as the king was to pay him the ultimate respect.

“Do you understand how high this man is?”

They nodded in unison.

“And do you understand how low we are in comparison?”

No movement, only saddened stares.

Lady Snowden sat down across from Helen and beckoned her to hold out her hands.

“Helen.”

“Hmm? Sorry. Yes ma’m? I’m a little tired.” Helen gave the Lady her hands. They were taken and grasped tightly.

“You cannot be tired, not anymore. I’m going to ask you to do something, and you have to do it.”

“What? What is it?”

“I’m sending you to Lord Loft’s residence. You will be attending to his son, Tobias Loft. You will serve his every need, whatever he desires. This includes indulging him sexually.”

It took moments for Helen to register the Lady’s words.

“Huh?! Ah! Oh... no. No way.”

The other children reacted accordingly. Lisa covered her mouth to stifle a scream. Elliot’s eyes and mouth gaped wide open in shock. Nate’s face contorted into a disgusted mockery of human expression. Clair’s was bathed in tears.

“Why Helen? This is not fair! Helen is the baby! She doesn’t deserve this!”

“You taught us. We should never stoop to sex work. We sleep with those we love. That’s the Snowden way. We’re not... not some... some... some fucking prostitutes!”

“Make me go instead. I’m experienced, I can jack this kid off. I don’t have any problem getting dirty. Everyone already thinks I’m a skank anyways. Send me, not Helen!”

“I won’t allow it. This is my warren. No one abuses someone from my warren. If you force her to go, you do it over my dead body.”

Aria took in their protests patiently, waiting for it to die down. At length, they sensed their outburst was not getting a reaction, and so they quieted down to hear their matriarch’s response.

“If we defy Loft, he will kill us all,” she said simply.

This statement subdued everyone but Nate.

“Who is Loft, that he can threaten an entire house just because we won’t coddle his kid?” he demanded to know.

“Loft is a Lord of a House, one that is not Snowden.”

Nate clenched his fists.

“We’re that weak?” he angrily asked.

“Yes.”

Nate had only the vaguest idea of what the realities of their existence were. In factual terms, it was quite stark. The population of Luft was a hair shy over one thousand. With twelve families to split it, the average House was eighty five members strong. Snowden had forty five. Concerning the various military units, the total number of soldiers was one hundred and fifty. Three were Snowden. Each house had at minimum a village to call their own territory, most had a city or fortress. Snowden’s “territory” was considered to be Silren Village, a walled settlement filled with mentally-diseased exiles, half of whom were not even hares. Members of the house were born sickly and underweight, and grew up slender and lacking muscle. They were quite useless for heavy labor. Their main residency at Coran Tur was granted out of the pity and largesse of the powerful House Moonmage. They had no political leverage and precious little wealth. If it came to war, any other house could eradicate them with relative ease. By threatening war, any other house could get whatever it wanted out of the Snowdens.

“We have a choice. Submit, or lose everything.”

“He wouldn’t really eradicate us, would he?” Lisa asked.

“Likely not. Lord Loft is not genocidal. I might have to die. Then also the trade deal with Thill’s loom would be cancelled, so the Council of Sloth would reclaim some beds from us. Twenty was the number I heard. You understand, if we don’t have the beds, we can’t have children, and without children, we’ll disappear due to outbreeding. It’s not a massacre, but it would destroy our future nonetheless. As Lady Snowden, I have to put the fate of the House above the dignity of one individual.”

“Why me?”

Helen, at last, spoke up. Her meek voice aired the one all-important concern of the warren. It was the one question that could soften Aria’s otherwise steely determination. She went around the table and took up Helen in her arms.

“Because you are the most innocent,” she said to the young girl.

It was difficult to explain to the children, who knew so little of the cultural norms outside the castle walls. Aria tried to do so, stumbling and stuttering at times. There were eons of history, incident and precedent piled atop one another, that could never be condensed into such a short conversation. She was at a loss for how to describe the ignominy of being a slave, of starving in the winter woods, of being kicked out of safety and feasted upon by monsters, of the orgies of rape and physical beatings, sometimes for the pleasure of the perpetrator, sometimes out of sheer malice and disdain. Aria recalled her own childhood, when she was like the youth before her, naïve as to the wider world and its undying revulsion at their practices.

“I made the mistake of wanting to give oral to my partner in Gold Sand River, in an alley I thought was unwatched. We were caught. He was dragged through the city streets in chains while Dustdays threw rotten food at him. I was forced to run behind him and collect that food, because we were sentenced to thirty days in prison, and it was to be our only sustenance for the duration. There were... many animal parts in that basket.”

Aria held her mouth. To this day, she could not eat meat.

“I’m sorry. All the other warrens are the wrong age. Clair, your reputation has spread to every corner of the tower. You can’t resist flirting, and that would doom you if you did so with anyone besides the young lord. Lisa, your fetishes are too extreme and too apparent to anyone who spends time with you. I think that the risk of either of you two incurring the Loft’s wrath is very high. With you Helen, shy and submissive as you are, you would be the most likely to survive this ordeal. It’s honestly better you waited so long to lose your virginity. Most other houses condemn sex before the age of seventeen. Your experience is closer to their norms. I wish that you were even older. This is all assuming you’ll be able to satisfy young Lord Loft. If you don’t feel capable of that task- I’m at a loss.”

Helen fell silent.

“You should go to your rooms and practice some more. Elliot and Nate, please don’t spare her. Teach her how to ride you and give oral. I’ll send word with your travel arrangements soon.”

“Lady Snowden.”

Clair had her hand raised once more.

“Yes Clair?” Aria was too exhausted to reprimand the interruption.

“I would like to go with Helen. To support her.”

Aria briefly contemplated the suggestion.

“No, that seems like a terrible idea. If Loft catches you “supporting” Helen, he’ll rafine you both.”

“I can keep abstinent. How long will this last?”

“Loft didn’t detail that. Anywhere from one night to a decade.”

“Oh. That’s long.”

“Exactly.”

Helen began whimpering. The girl looked to be falling apart, mentally.

Aria rubbed her brow, reconsidering the situation.

“I was planning on sending Simon with Helen. Clair, do you think you could limit your physical affections to Simon for a year?”

“Ooo, Simon! Yes, easily.”

The boys rolled their eyes.

“Just because he’s in the military and buff,” Nate muttered.

“Fine. This will be a test, but I’m putting my faith in you. Don’t let me down. Helen. Helen dear.”

The girl had been very quiet aside from whimpering and inaudible mutterings.

“The future of House Snowden rests on you.”

“Why?”

“I told you why. I’ll explain again if-”

“Why are Snowden nymphomaniacs? Why can’t we be like all the other houses?”

Aria rubbed a hand through Helen’s pale hair.

“I’ll tell you when you come back.”


	8. Children and "Children"

The five children gathered in Lady Snowden’s personal residence. Three made use of the triple-bed to carry out the Lady’s orders, while two others watched from a nook. I say children, but to a Snowden, anyone who isn’t a parent is still a child. There was certainly a difference between the runts playing outside and the pubescents frolicking in the bed.

“You look exhausted,” Lisa said to Elliot.

He nodded wordlessly to the affirmative.

“It’s hard to make a virgin cum. I’m surprised you even managed. But you didn’t climax at all?”

“Clair helped after,” Elliot said. Lisa smiled in relief.

“Good. Good! It’s a wonderful... day.” Lisa’s smile faded.

They turned their gaze to the bed. Nate sat with his back against the headboard. His pants and underwear were stripped off and his penis left exposed. It was currently half-erect and waving about freely. Clair and Helen, the former clothed and the latter naked, were crouched over Nate’s crotch. Clair was taking turns giving the cock attention and explaining what she was doing to Helen. Helen, for her part, was attentive but a bit confused.

“It feels wrong, doesn’t it?” Lisa said.

“Yeah.”

“This should be a happy occasion. We finally got Helen’s cherry popped. I was looking forward to it. The orgies, all of us together. But they made her to do it a bit earlier than she was comfortable with, just so they could pawn her away. I don’t like it.”

“Me neither,” Elliot agreed.

“Clair’s going too. Our warren is going to be too small.”

Elliot turned his focus from the bedroom to the back door. The communal stairwell was crowded and noisy. A dozen children, mostly hares but some other houses as well, leapt up and down the steps with reckless abandon.

“There’s no one who can really replace them, either,” Elliot noted.

Lisa counted it out.

“Silvi and Jessi are how old?”

“Ten and eleven. And I think Jessi’s parents want to hold her Ish Bin Hare later. They’re pretty attached.”

“So three, maybe four years? That’s too long.”

“They’ll probably want to form their own warren anyways.”

“Right. Meh.” Lisa slumped into despondency.

“We could ask Nina?”

“She’s twenty five.”

“So? She’s all alone.”

“I suppose. It’ll be weird. Have you ever had sex with her?” Lisa asked.

“No.”

“Hmm.”

“Ah!” Helen’s utterance caught their attention. Clair had gotten Nate to climax. The cum had shot out in a high arc and landed on Helen’s face. She wasn’t taking it very well. She whined aloud and frantically reached for the covers to wipe it off.

“Helen no! Not the lady’s blankets! Use this!” Clair thrust a piece of clothing into Helen’s hands.

“Eww! Eh? No! I’m not using my dress!”

“Helen. Stop. Calm down. Here.” Not even Clair’s patented full-power oral service was enough to perturb Nate. Amidst the aftershocks of his own orgasm he still managed to take off his shirt and offer it to Helen. She greedily accepted and wiped off the offensive fluids from her face. When finished, she started to hand it back, but then realized the impropriety. She stared down at the cum stained shirt, up at Nate, and back and forth again.

“Ah. It’s soiled.”

“It’s alright. I’ll get one of the lady’s shirts.” Nate reached up and wiped the last dribble of cum from her forehead.

“I love you,” Helen uttered, holding onto Nate’s hand.

“Love you too.” Nate slid down fully onto his back. He reached up and pulled Helen down on top of him, hugging her tight. “We’ll teach you straddling next, when I’m ready.”

“Mmm. ‘Kay.” Helen laid her cheek alongside Nate’s and pressed her body against his. She had never taken Nate’s cock inside of her, but this close embrace was nothing new. It was comforting, to a degree. Clair tried toying around with the pair’s genitals, but received a kick in the face for her impudence.

A noise stirred outside the door. It was barely cracked open, just enough for Lisa and Elliot to see outside. Suspicious whispers and footsteps could be heard from just beyond. The door creaked open an inch wider.

“Hey!”

Lisa jumped in front of the widening aperture.

“What’s going on? What are you doing?”

“Eden don’t look!”

A troop of small boys crowded around the exterior, straining to get a look inside.

“I heard a cry. What’re you doing? Huh? Miss Lisa, is that Nate in there?”

Lisa, instantly joined by Elliot, blocked the youth’s entry.

“Go away!” Elliot ordered.

“But why? What’re you doing? Are you guys doing that adult stuff? Huh? Huh?”

“You’re not supposed to see this.”

“But why?” Eden, the ringleader, played coy, then suddenly lunged to break inside. “I wanna see! I wanna see! I wanna see! I wanna OUCH!”

Elliot had bopped him on the head. The injury was sufficient to stop his break-in efforts, though not his protests.

“It’s not fair! We wanna do it too!”

“Do you even have any idea what we’re doing?”

“Sure sure! Mommy and daddy do it all the time. They don’t think I see em but I sneak a peek at night.” The boy looked so proud of himself. Elliot and Lisa looked mortified.

“Me and Niko do it all the time too!”

“Oh God!” Lisa covered her mouth.

“Don’t we?” Eden turned to his comrades for affirmation.

Another small boy in the back nodded.

“I don’t see what’s the big deal. It’s like, you grownups are so super-secret about it. It’s not like Beckben hide it. Why do you got to be so weird?”

“Beckben?” Elliot stared at Eden, completely befuddled. “What about Beckben?” As far as he knew, the bears didn’t expose their mating rituals to the world.

“On redbox.”

“Redbox?”

“You know. Tigbar. The uh, fight club.”

Realization dawned in Elliot’s eyes. Lisa was still puzzled, she wasn’t much into sports and couldn’t make the connection as fast.

“Wrestling!”

“Ohhh!”

Elliot nodded knowingly.

“Yeah, that’s what we’re doing. Wrestling. But it’s the secret Snowden-style wrestling technique! We have to practice it in secret or else they won’t be surprised when we bust it out on them. So keep quiet and go away, or else you’ll be a liability. Do you know what that word means?”

“Li-ah-bil-i-ty. Uh, no, but I can pronounce it. You grownups think you’re so smart, making up words. I bet it’s made up.”

“It means you’re prone to getting caught and squealing on us.”

“No I won’t! I’m not a squealer!”

“Yes you are! You’re just as wimpy as all the rest of us! We’re so wimpy, we have to use a trick to win wrestling matches, but you’ll blow it if you get even a glimpse. So shoo!”

“But I wanna know the secret! Gonzo is a bully, I wanna lay one on him!”

“You can’t. You’re not old enough.” Elliot waggled his finger in the kid’s face.

“You grownups always say that! How old do I got to be?”

“When you have your Ish Bin Hare. That’s when.”

“That’s...” The kid counted out his age on his fingers. He messed up several times when he got into the tens digits. Eventually he wizened up and began using his toes.

“Four years.”

“How old are you?”

“Ten!”

“Maybe if you’re a good boy who listens to his parents and sempais, you’ll get your Ish Bin Hare in three years.”

“Oh! Okay! I’ll go, I guess.”

“And stop watching fight club on the redbox! It’s too violent for you,” Lisa admonished.

“But it’s so cool! Hey, hey, I know! Let’s go make up our own secret wrestling moves!” The boys scampered off down the steps.

Elliot and Lisa let out a sigh of relief.

“What a pain.” Elliot said.

“They’ll learn when they’re ready,” Lisa said.

“Maybe. I figured it out before then.”

“Did you do anything naughty?”

“No.” Elliot shook his head. “Just my brother told me about it. What about you?”

“I knew a lot, and really wanted to do stuff with Clair-”

“We kissed!” Clair added from the bed.

“But we were good girls and kept our hands off each other until our ceremonies.”

“Bet that was hard.” Elliot stared off wistfully at the retreating youth. “Poor kids. We have to keep them ignorant while we’re screwing all the time.”

“It’s necessary,” Nate said.

“Well, yeah, the others won’t let us. They’d put us in jail.”

“It’s not about what other houses think. It’s just morally wrong. God didn’t make us sexual from birth, he made us wait till puberty. Kids are innocent and shouldn’t be doing that kind of stuff. We grownups shouldn’t be encouraging or abetting it. _Period_. We’re already pushing it as is.”

“Yes papa, you’re right,” Clair said sarcastically.

Throughout all Helen was silent. She remembered her own Ish Bin Hare- roughly, “Here I Am!”- the ceremony where Snowden youth are introduced as sexually available adolescents. It was such a nervous day for her.


	9. The Talk

Helen stared blankly at her parents. Her mother Rime Snowden held hands with her father Leto Snowden. The trio was seated, they on chairs and she on the bedside. Her tush lay rigid at the edge of the mattress. Her arms hung stiff at her sides. She unconciously curled her fingers around the sheets, gripping them tight. After all the rush and fuss to get ready for her all-important ceremony, this quiet sit-down was more distressing than anything imaginable. The parents tried to put her at ease with smiles and reassuring gestures. It wasn’t working. She was still processing the revelations being related to her.

“I’m still confused.”

“Well, the boy’s sperm needs permission to enter the egg-”

Helen shook her head.

“No I understand all that. What I don’t get is _why_. You have sex to make babies. But you can’t make babies without an empty bed. God says so. So why do you still do it all the time? Do you need practice? Is it hard to do?”

“No, it’s not that hard... unless you want it to be... but we’re not really, um, er...”

“Dear.” Rime put a hand up to interrupt her bumbling husband. She gazed earnestly at her daughter. “Helen, you are our wonderful, beautiful, smart little girl. You understand the Law of Beds, even at your age. You should be able to see what comes of that.”

Helen considered her mother’s words. She took what she knew of the third law- that each person owns a bed, and every bed can only have one owner. That for a woman to conceive a child, she and the father must copulate atop an unowned bed. Then that bed becomes the property of that fetal child. Finally, mortals cannot build their own beds, only God can. Thus, the Law of Beds is really...

“Population control,” Helen said aloud. “So God can control the number of people that are alive at any one time. He can control where they live and which government they have to obey. For balance, I guess? So no one gets too much power. Is that it?”

Rime sighed, but with a soft and knowing smile.

“You’re much too smart, and much too innocent.”

“I’m wrong?”

“You’re not wrong at all, but you haven’t answered your own question.”

Helen frowned, frustrated. She tried again.

“Sex is for... to make sure the beds are never empty, in case someone dies.” Even Helen knew this answer was too feeble to be the real reason. All too often she caught older Snowden hiding in nooks and crannies all around the tower, empty spaces without a bed in sight, doing _something_ she now had a name for. Indeed, this conversation had gone a long way to explaining this mystery that had surrounded her all her childhood. Yet she still couldn’t comprehend the reason for it.

“I don’t get it!” she said with a huff.

“Helen, have you ever... touched yourself?”

“Huh?”

“Down here?” Rime reached over and very lightly caressed her daughter’s inner thigh.

“Yes.”

“And when you did, did you feel something?”

“Um.” Helen thought over this question very carefully. She had of course felt _something_ , but it had been so sudden and alarming that she had quickly backed off. Her first thought was that she was sick. Her second was that she was defective and strange. It was embarrassing and she had determined to keep it to herself. To have it brought up unbidden by her parents instantly warned her of its greater importance.

“I don’t know,” she answered unsurely.

“Honey,” Leto caught Rime’s attention. “Maybe she isn’t as far along as we thought. Should we postpone the ceremony?”

“Not after all the work we spent on it! We can’t cancel it now!”

“We can’t send her out there like this.”

“I know that.”

“We could ask Simon to watch over her.”

“Yes. Yes that’s a good idea.”

“What are you talking about? You keep changing the subject.”

Rime leaned down to face her daughter eye to eye.

“Well, to put it as simply as possible. That feeling you get when you touch yourself, that’s a part of sex. I’m sure, in the months ahead, you’ll explore your own body and discover that it feels very good to touch yourself in different ways. Helen, the answer to your question is this:”

Helen sat up straight and attentive.

“Sex feels good. Sex with yourself feels good. Sex with another human feels very good. It’s like a massage, or head pat, or a kiss. It’s as exciting as a mine cart ride and soothing as a warm bath on a cold day. As if your breasts and vulva could taste things and were given the sweetest chocolate to savor. And when you do it with someone you love and cherish, like I love and cherish your father, sex is the very best feeling in the world.”

Little Helen fell into a dazzled state of epiphany.

“But...”

Rime hushed her with a finger.

“You want to ask why something like this must be kept secret, and why you little children must be kept in the dark and forbidden from learning about sex, or doing it on your own?”

Helen nodded.

“It is because sex is not always the best feeling in the world. It can cause hurt feelings, and unwanted attention, and drives one person to make unreasonable demands upon another person. And then this, above all- when someone you don’t like forces you to have sex you don’t want, it is one of the worst feelings in the world. That is called rape. And it is a sin.”

After their conversation, Helen needed to be alone to process it all. Her thoughts meandered through everything she had learned. Naturally, curiosity led her to touch herself. She was nervous but no longer confused about what these strange feelings arising in her groin were. In short order she discovered masturbation and then orgasm. Then, lying there and recovering, the question that would haunt her for years to come first occurred.

“Why us?”

Even at that young age, with carnal knowledge not half an hour old, Helen understood.

There was something different between Snowden and all the other houses-something about sex. All the other houses treated adults like Snowden treated their children- as if sex was something private, sacred, even forbidden. But for Snowden, it was just a poorly kept secret, a common indulgence, to be practiced anytime and anywhere with a facsimile of cover. Why? She couldn’t possibly answer that question yet, and the ignorance made her feel ashamed.


	10. Ish Bin Hare "Here I Am!"

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A sketch of Helen in her ceremonial dress.

“Rime! Oh my gosh your girl is so cute!”

“I heart it.”

“Adorbs.”

“Her usagimono is max pretty. Who made it? You did? Oh please make my daughter’s!”

“She’s going to be a fine young woman.”

The compliments flowed in from all comers. Everything was praised- the decorations, the food, the venue, the hosts, Helen herself, Helen’s looks, Helen’s dress, Helen’s accomplishments, Helen’s family, and so on. The chapel was overflowing with gracious guests of every age and class, and all had nice things to say. Call it a testament to Rime’s hard work, both within the Snowden community and on this occasion in particular.

Helen herself stood on the steps by the altar, greeting each guest in turn with simple polite phrases. She was rather mechanical about the whole affair, which to a knowing onlooker would come off as a well-trained response to an overwhelming situation.

“You look wonderful in your zesta.”

“Thank you. Thank you for coming,” Helen smiled and curtsied.

She was adorned in her zesta, or usagimono- the former a contraction for ‘zodiac vestment’, the traditional apparel reserved for very special occasions, the latter a style of zesta particular to House Snowden. Like all zestas, usagimono incorporate elements of the house’s sigil animal, the hare. Helen’s usagimono was a snow-white leotard with an overlaid sheer frock, bow-tied gloves and patterned tights. Her head was adorned with a wispy pair of rabbit ears, and a cute and fluffy tail bun lay nestled on her tush. The assemble was completed with the traditional snow-white scarf of her house, with a small inlay of six interconnected diamond stars, the sign of her family branch.

The best that could be said of Helen’s mood was that she felt pretty. Elsewise, she was torn up by the revelations mere hours before. No matter how her parents had tried to reassure her, she could only think of the dire warnings that accompanied the many promises of pleasure and love that were now open to her.

“Helen, girl, over here.” The Lady waved for her to accompany her to the back of the chapel. A bell tinged and the ceremony commenced. Leto and Rime took a stand behind their daughter. Lady Aria took her hand and led her down the aisle to the altar. Words of wisdom and invocation were dispensed, for God’s blessing, for the community’s support, for the guidance of her elders and the embrace of her peers. Then little Helen was pushed to the forefront.

“Ah.” She paused. There was a recitation she was supposed to give, but her voice failed. Short, stressed breaths afflicted her chest. Fear clung in her eyes. “Well, here I am!” she cried out, cutting the recitation down to its final line. A rustle of whispers and nervous shifting ran through the room. All eyes fell on the unfortunate girl. She couldn’t bear it anymore. She managed a short curtsy, and then scurried out the back of the chapel.

Later on in the evening the party guests migrated to the Residential Tower lounge and café. Helen hid in the loft dining area, listening in on their conversations.

“It happens from time to time.”

“She wasn’t ready.”

“Do you think it wise of Rime to out her so soon?”

“There were factors, I’m told.”

“Oh, what kind?”

“Pressure from the higher ups.”

“Oh really? For what purpose? And just how high are we talking?”

“Well I can’t say why, it would be bad gossip, but I can say it was the highest of higher ups.”

“Oh dear. The Lady...”

“Have you seen the girl?”

“She’s probably back in her room.”

“I hope so. My girl’s been much too forward about what she wants to with Helen. I can’t find her anywhere.”

“And what of the parents?”

“Leto’s doing his duty. Rime, I think, is searching for Simon. Have you seen him? He didn’t show up.”

“She’s looking in vain, then. He was sent to Clefton by his officer, some emergency popped up.”

Helen buried her head in her arms and cried.

This was not how it was supposed to go. It was a terrible embarrassment, and a stain on her parents’ reputation. Her reticence had turned a joyful coming-out celebration into an anti-social nightmare.

Footsteps sounded on the loft stairwell. A smartly-dressed young man emerged from the doorway. Trim haired, clean, lean, and taller than his age would suggest, he would be considered handsome and manly by Snowden standards. Helen lifted her head and eyed him warily.

“Hi Helen.”

“Nate.”

“It’s me.”

He took a seat beside her. He set his hand down on her wrist. She noticed it was shaking.

“Wanted to give you company, see how you were holding up.”

“Well. You saw me.”

“That’s nothing. I was way more embarrassing. You didn’t do the dance, but that’s better than trying to do the dance and tripping over yourself.”

A wry smile escaped Helen’s lips. “I remember that.”

“You going to be okay?” he asked.

“Maybe.”

“You’ll be okay,” he insisted.

He had sat himself right beside her, almost touching. She shifted a bit to give herself space. He responded by closing the gap once more.

The small talk and shallow reassurances continued on for a while. She noticed he was being earnest but unsure about himself; he noticed she was being evasive and unsure about him.

“There’s no real need to be nervous. They told you what the Ish Bin Hare is for, right?”

“It’s when I have to move out of my parent’s room.”

“Well no, you don’t _have_ to. Unless your parents are forcing you. But they’re nice people, they wouldn’t do that to you.”

“They are.”

This took Nate aback.

“Why?”

“They won’t say. They say they’re really sorry about it, but won’t say why.”

“Huh.” Nate gave it thought. “Well, that’s bad. But it’s not so different than what a lot of other hares do, right? I moved out at fourteen. Course, it was sort of mutual. My parents wanted to go back to being a warren, and I didn’t like living under their rules anymore. You know, if you need a place to stay, there’s room where I’m at.”

“Really?” Helen tilted her head up.

“Sure. There’s four of us. Me and Elliot, Lisa and Clair. There’s only two beds, but we have plenty of couch space. If you want to join us.”

“Could I?”

This unexpected offer alleviated at least one major concern for Helen. It was customary for young pubescent hares to move out of their parent’s residence and join a warren, a small group of peers. It was usually voluntary, however, and not forced, certainly not forced so shortly after one’s Ish Bin Hare.

Nate leaned over.

“Of course, since you’ll be in a warren, you’ll get to do all the things you couldn’t before.” The boy turned round to directly face her. His hands began caressing the edges of her frame. His face was full of expectation.

“You mean sex,” Helen said. Her face was full of trepidation.

“Yeah, that’s the big one.” Nate bowed in, close to her. “I was wondering, if you’d like, if I could be your first.”

“I...” Helen fell silent. She had no answer for that question, no appropriate response for something so incredibly profane. She knew what the Ish Bin Hare was really for, and in the back of her mind, she knew this moment would come.

Nate took her reticence for permission. He closed the gap and kissed her, her first kiss. It was surprising, and surprisingly pleasant. She reciprocated a little. Nate, caught up in passion and feeling emboldened, took her up in his arms and lifted her atop the table. His hands worked quickly and efficiently, gently disrobing her frock and pulling her leotard and stockings aside.

“But...” Helen uttered. Nate held still. The girl underneath him lay on her back, with her legs spread and nubile breasts exposed. For all appearances she was welcoming him- except for her eyes. She wouldn’t meet him eye to eye, and that gave him pause.

“What’s the matter?” he asked.

“Nothing,” she responded.

“Do you not like me?”

“I... don’t really know you.”

“This is how Snowden get to know one another.”

“It feels strange. I don’t know. Do what you want.”

Nate bowed his head and tensed up. His lips pursed tightly together.

The boy’s hands went to her chest, and began the delicate process of fixing her leotard back over her frame. She shivered when his hands found her breasts, but the touch was fleeting. In moments, her chest was modestly covered once again. When he was finished, her usagimono was righted and proper, if a little bit wrinkled from the ordeal. He then crouched over her and lifted her into his arms in a warm embrace. His head rested on her shoulders, and hers on his.

“You aren’t ready for sex, are you?” he whispered.

“I don’t know,” she answered. Her feelings welled up in that bittersweet moment, and finally bubbled out of her. “I’m scared. I’m afraid of sex. Of people and feelings and things. I touched myself and it felt... good? But all my life they’ve told me things like that are bad, are wrong, that I shouldn’t know about it or try it for myself. That it’s not allowed. And my parents say it was just because I was too young and now it’s okay because it’s some random day with a random embarrassing party being thrown over my head, but that’s stupid and not true at all and nothing has changed about me since yesterday! And it’s only Snowden that say it’s okay. The other houses... you can tell, can’t you?”

“Yeah.”

“They always look down on us and mistreat us, and now I think I know why. Because sex is _not_ okay, it’s wrong. It’s some distasteful thing we have to put up with to make babies.”

“But that’s not what Snowden think. We think sex is a good thing, to be enjoyed and celebrated.”

“What makes us right and them wrong?” Helen cried.

“Ah. Uh. Um... I can’t say for sure, but this is what my dad told me. It’s okay for us because we decided it for ourselves. It’s not okay for them because that’s what they decided for themselves. It’s their fault for butting in to other house’s business.”

“Is it? I’m so confused. I’m so scared.”

“I don’t really get what you’re getting at.” Nate’s embrace tightened. “But I’ll promise you this. If you’re not comfortable having sex, come join my warren. I’ll protect you, and no one there will make you do anything you don’t want to. You can come along at your own pace. If it takes a long while for you to open up, that’s okay. If you decide you never want to try it, that’s okay too.”

“Really?”

Nate disengaged the hug, but his gaze remained fixed on her.

“I’ve got a confession.”

“Hmm?”

“Your grades in school. They were always better than mine. I was jealous. I always thought you were pretty, but knowing how smart you were just made me want to hang out with you so badly. I was too scared to do anything about it though. Um-” Now it was Nate’s turn to show shyness, a blush lighting up his cheeks. “I like you. I want you to join my warren, and I don’t care if that means we sleep together or not. I just want to copy notes from you and stuff. And maybe care for you. And if you feel like it, maybe care for me too. And Elliot, and Lisa, and Clair.”

Helen grasped Nate’s cheeks and thrust her lips onto his. Nate flinched in shock. This kiss lasted long, long enough to be enjoyed to its fullest.

“Thank you.” She bowed her head before him. “Um. I’m not ready. You’re right. But maybe someday, I can work out these knots. Then... I think I might like to try it with you.”

 


	11. Getting Dressed

“Sorry to make you wait.”

“Hmm?”

“I promised you we’d do it one day. At my Ish Bin Hare.”

“Oh. That? I don’t recall you being definite about it. Much less a promise.”

“It was a promise in my mind.”

“Well, don’t be sorry. You’re right on time.”

Helen lay on Nate’s chest, breathing heavily. His dick was still embedded in her, seeping semen into her canal. He had to admit, secretly to himself, for a complete amateur she had done well. It was as satisfying as anything he ever did with Lisa or Clair. Though he wondered if that was because he’d been anticipating this days in his heart for two long years. She was special to him.

Clair lay draped on the bedside. Her hand rubbed up and down Helen’s buttocks and thighs, not suggestive but soothing in nature. Lisa and Elliot sat on the opposite bed holding hands. All eyes lay fawningly over their newly deflowered lover. Helen basked in their love, and cried for it. This wouldn’t last. It was only making the imminent reality more starkly terrifying in contrast.

“I’m scared.”

“Be strong.”

“I don’t know him. I don’t know if he’ll love me, or care for me or be gentle or kind. He’s only a name to me. He’s not you all. I love you all so much.”

“It’ll work out,” Clair insisted. “I’ll be there for you.”

Helen whined and grasped all the tighter to her warren mates.

There came a knock on the door.

“Get lost! For the last time no peeking!” Lisa shouted.

“Is that how you address your lady?”

“Madam! Oh gosh, I’m so sorry!” Lisa leapt to the door and opened it wide. Lady Aria strode in, glaring maliciously at the impudent young woman.

“I thought you were the brats. They were trying to barge in on us.”

All maliciousness melted away, replaced by sincere understanding.

“Of course, of course. Our own?” Aria inquired.

“No. A Basilton or two, I think.”

“Good grief, by all means, don’t let them see you.” The Lady rolled her eyes heavenward and muttered profanities under her breath. She turned her gaze on her wards.

“I see you’ve been acquainted.”

Helen slid off Nate. The both of them were butt naked. Nate was unfazed, but Helen unconsciously crossed her legs and pulled a sheet over her breasts.

“Get dressed. You’re leaving tonight.”

“Tonight?!”

“We’re out of time.”

Lady Aria began busying herself about her quarters. The kids sensed she was packing, in quite a hurry at that.

“You’re coming with us?” Clair asked.

“Only so far. A matter’s come up in Gold Sand River we need to attend to.”

“We?” Nate asked.

“We the Heads of House.”

She held up a warning finger. _Ask no more,_ it warned them.

“You’ll be continuing on to Triss without me.”

“Just the girls? Alone? I’ve never been farther than Clefton,” Nate said. He looked at the pair of girls who were to travel. They’d never even been that far. All their lives was encapsulated by the tower and surrounding hills. Such a trip-

“Not alone, hair-brains. I told you, Sami, Lily, Cory, and Nile are all going to Thill, they will travel with you. And Simon will be with you every step of the way- he will be staying to watch over you two in Triss. Clair, I’m warning you- best behavior. Don’t you smirk. You’re going to hear this every mile, if necessary. They will jail you for things that are perfectly normal around here. They will hurt you for the slightest impropriety. They will _kill_ you if you dare transgress them. Do you understand?”

“Yes ma’am.”

“Get dressed, all of you. Where is your shirt? Is this it?” Aria lifted the cum-stained article from the corner of the room.

“Sorry.”

“Never mind.”

“May I use one of yours?” Nate asked.

“Go ahead. Any will do, I don’t care. Wash it if you abuse it!”

They searched the wardrobe. To Nate’s dismay, there was not a single ordinary shirt fit for masculine wear contained within. Everything was elegant feminine wear, from the skin-tight dresses to the see-through camisoles. What’s more, even for the typical Snowden these gowns were luxurious beyond imagination. Silken gossamer threads interwove in minute intricate patterns, radiating a jewel-like splendor from betwixt every sensual fold and embellishment.

“I...” Nate was balking. His face was aghast. A second later a men’s tunic was flung on his head.

“You can have mine,” Elliot said, having instantly taken the opportunity to satiate his greatest fetish. The young man eagerly dove in and picked out the richest (read: sexiest) dress of the stack and dragged it over his head. He went to admire himself in the nearby mirror.

“Am I cute?”

“Very cute. Now get gone. Girls, to your room, pack up.”

Clair and Lisa both jumped on Elliot. “Super cute!” “We can do a quickie in our room!” Their hands were all over his perfectly outlined buttocks.

“Hey wait!” Nate put on Elliot’s shirt and then went to Helen.

“One moment.”

The Lady went into the wardrobe and came out with another dress. This one was not so rich and sensual as Elliot’s pick. It was rather modest, actually, being a bit formal and stiff, covering the arms and reaching far down the legs. It reminded Helen of the uniforms they wore to school.

“Wear this with tights.” Aria handed Helen the dress, a look of fondness, but also worry and strain, worn upon her face. Helen slowly and clumsily donned the gift. She turned about in her new apparel.

“It suits you,” Aria said, appraising her.

Nate let off a fleeting frown. Elliot was fine and all wearing that sizzling slip with the belly-deep cut, but Nate would have much rather seen it on Helen. The schoolgirl outfit... wasn’t doing it for him.

“I hope and pray to God Simon can keep you safe. Meet him in the central chamber in one hour.”

She ushered the pair out the back door. Just as she did so, a knock came upon her front door.


	12. Simon

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The high road leading to Coran Tur's main gate.

“Watch it watch it watch it!”

“Don’t let it grab ya jav!”

“Jab it jab it!”

“Right in ther eye!”

“Take em!”

“Sim Sim! Get an arrow’n there! In ther eye!”

“On it captain!”

Simon let out a deep breath and steadied his body. All his training, all his exercise, all his nerves and muscles, focused his form into the exact shape of his mind’s conception. The bow lay loose and relaxed on his forearm.

The Grontling thrashed wildly, then tired ever so slightly and went still for a single moment.

Simon’s body snapped into motion. His left arm stretched out rigid, bringing the bow to bear. His right arm knocked the arrow and drew the bowstring back in a single smooth, flawless motion. The bow went taught for a timeless instant, and then shivered. The weapon snapped to a rest, releasing its missile. The arrow whistled through the air, a sound more than a visible object. The Grontling’s next motions were agonized death throes, reeling and wretching until it at last convulsed backwards and fell down the steep hillslope. The arrow buried in its eye waved round and round as the creature crashed down towards the river.

“Good job! Great job! Woah oop! Here comes another!”

More Grontlings appeared hopping up the hillside. Simon wrinkled his nose in disgust. They resembled pigs but with beady eyes, standing on their haunches, a million times more wrinkled and pruned, smelling not like dank but natural manure but rather rank and loathing bug skive, and all armed with primitive stone mauls and spears. These were tier 1 monsters, typical nuisances of the Nearlands, and like all the rest of their ilk too stupid and too hostile to know they were no match for the humans.

Bravo, Selo, and Tort kept them off the elevated path with their javelins. Captain Ivy used her sling to rain flashbang nuts down on their heads. Between the four Basilton warriors, twenty or even thirty Grontlings were no big deal, especially with the terrain advantage. Even with his archery talents, Simon Snowden wasn’t there to pitch in with the fighting, really. His job was to keep a lookout, making sure the patrol wasn’t flanked or a more threatening monster didn’t ambush them. Nonetheless, that he got a single kill gave him immense satisfaction.

“Two and two and two and two!” Selo and Tort coordinated lunges, taking the eyes out of several Grontlings in succession.

“Bravo!”

Bravo jumped into action. He flung himself off the path and onto the backs of the disgusting creatures, jabbing left and right into their confused ranks. One last intrepid assailant swung at his head with a stone hammer. It struck true- but the otter just turned and grit his teeth in a battle-crazed smile. The monster shrieked in surprise. Bravo’s last thrust pushed his javelin through the monster’s mouth and out the back of its neck. The group celebrated their victory with a cheer.

“Good going! Good job! You’re a keeper!” Captain Ivy rubbed her broad hand through Simon’s jet-black hair. He couldn’t help but grin.

“What’s that count?”

“I got five.”

“Bravo’s seven.”

“Seven for me too.”

“You’re double counting with me.”

“No no, you’re double counting with me!”

Selo and Tort began squabbling between them over kill counts, while Ivy tracked the actual total from confirmed corpses.

“Twenty-two,” Ivy spat out. She took out her pocket notebook and began scribbling furiously. “Way too many this close to the tower. Something’s got them rustled. Ought to send patrol in force down the river. Maybe being pushed out by incursion from the desert.” She put the notebook away. “Hey! Snowden! So what’s that, third kill?”

“Eighth,” Simon corrected her.

“Where you sneaking kills on us, huh?”

“Captain Trireme brought me sniping along the Zabrael road last month. Got my second through sixth.”

“Ah, well good for you! Trireme’s a sport.”

Simon chuckled.

“He’s a beast, frankly. A tier 2 showed up.”

“You don’t say! What’d that go? Surely good, didn’t hear any deaths come out the garrison.”

“It was a Dune Mantis. It attacked the road alone, so Trireme had us all locked in on it. We put about thirty arrows into it then the captain went and one-on-oned it. He took a bad gash from the claws but gored up its throat pretty bad. It tried running away but our archers finished it off.”

“Woo, so cool! You counting that one?”

“No.” Simon shook his head politely. “We all gave the credit to the captain.”

“Dune Mantis. Hmm. Nice trophy to have. Well if they’re coming out the desert, better make sure we’re prepared. Wall shields and lances, you know.”

“I’d be happy to join you.”

“Happy to have you. Eh? Incoming.”

A human came prancing down the pathway. By his hair and dress, it looked like a Snowden, one of the Lady’s personal assistants.

“Ma’am.” He nodded curtly to Captain Ivy and then went directly to Simon. He handed over a sealed letter. Simon nodded and took the message with discomforting interest. That feeling deepened as he read the letter.

“Looks like I won’t be able to join you after all.”

“Aw, what’s up?”

“I’m being recalled by the Lady. She’s sending me on a long term assignment.”

Simon nodded to his superior.

“Well it was fun having you! Take care of those rabbits! You’re the one true hare in that bunch! Dismissed!” Simon saluted, Ivy saluted in kind.

The young soldier’s shoulders went limp as he climbed up the path.

“That woman...” he muttered. He was perfectly content to run monster-cleansing patrols around the tower. He dreamed, one day, he’d get to go on a real mission, one of the deep rangings into the Farlands where tier 2s were as common as insects and any moment could bring one face to face with the true terrors of civilization, the tier 4 abominations. He could handle that kind of danger, easily. What the Lady asked of him was far, far worse. A different kind of fear, a threat he couldn’t account for, was now tasked to him.

 

“Come in.”

Simon strode into the Lady’s quarters. On one arm, his weapon kit, on the other, a travel pack. He set them down on the floor, then faced his matriarch with a stony glare.

Aria eyed him.

He was tall for a hare, strong for a hare, good looking and manly for a hare- which was all to say he was average for any given soldier. His apparel was typical southern military outfit, tunic with short trousers, leather belt and chest strap worn over a solid iron breastplate. Narrow, shortened padboots were not for marching but rather sprinting, commensurate with Snowden’s usual military role as scouts and runners. Like all hares, he could hardly grow a wisp of a beard, giving him a kidlike appearance. His dark hair was house-typical, his blue eyes were not. A gift of a far-back Basilton ancestor, perhaps. A narrow face and wide eyes were rigid, rarely overly expressive. Not in this moment, however.

“Don’t stare at me like that,” Aria warned.

Simon shook with emotion. His hands balled into fists.

“Stand down! That is an order from your lady!”

Simon made a great effort to relax. His hands slowly unclenched.

“I don’t care what you think-” she began to lecture.

“Of all the eligible girls,” Simon interrupted.

“My decision is final and for the good of the house. I will not tolerate questioning.”

“-and you chose _HER_!”

“Quiet!”

“Not this time! Ma’am!”

The lady and soldier eyed each other down into a deathly silence. Their nerves and wills clashed for a seeming endless minute. At last, it was the lady who gave in. She resolved this the best way she knew how.

“Come here,” she said, but was already moving towards her ward. Simon flinched, but then accepted her embrace. She began planting kisses on his brow, then cheek, then ear, then neck. Her nose nuzzled into his nape. Her hands worked their way into the backside of his pants.

“I don’t want to be coddled-”

“This way.”

She led him to the couch. There she worked her hands over his pants, his chest, and so forth, until she had his armor off. A light dash of the fingers across the fabric covering his cock, and all emotions of anger left his mind.

“Now tell me what you need to,” she said with a coo.

“You can’t do this.”

“I have to do this.”

“You have to send a girl. It doesn’t have to be Helen.”

“It must be Helen.”

Simon covered his face with his hands.

The Lady spoke out calmly. “She doesn’t quite belong. She’s always had questions, always sought answers we couldn’t give. She can find her answers up there. She’ll see for herself, with the help of an outside perspective. And her attitude is much more Loft-like than any of the other young Snowden.”

“I get it. It makes sense. It’s reasonable to any outsider. But I know the real reason you’re doing this to her. And it’s unfair. It’s not her fault.”

“The past is the past,” Aria hummed.

“It was not her parent’s fault either. You’re punishing the whole family for the sins of Bolero. He-”

“No more.” She put her finger to his lips, then followed with her lips. He gave in. What else could he do? Their mesh of flesh lasted long and deepened. A wet tongue found its way into his orifice. When she parted, her hands moved inside his pants continue her work. “My decision is final. I know you care for them. They were your warren after all. Show your love by watching over and protecting their daughter. I know you’ll give it your best effort.” Aria slowly lowered herself down. Her lips surrounded his cock, and her fingers dug into his crotch.

Simon cursed himself.

_Weak. I’m so weak._

And of course, she was very good at this. Such skill is to be expected of the queen of the nymphs. It was a weapon, in its own way.

When his cum was inside her and swallowed, she kissed him once more and embraced him. He clung to her, all anger vanished, like a helpless, cowed child.

“Are you scared?” she asked him.

“For myself? No. For her, greatly.”

“I can’t say that’s good, but it is proper. You are going to an angry, hateful nest. It will be dangerous in ways you can’t predict. But I think you, more than any of us, can handle it. Please take care of the girls.”

Simon grimaced.

“Allow me this petty grudge. You are my contrition. I would not risk you if I truly wanted to hurt Helen.”

“You’re a wicked bitch,” Simon groused lowly.

“I’m a deviant, like the rest of us.” Aria shrugged and propped up her favorite underling. “God bless your journey.”


	13. A Den of Envy

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Zabrael Docks

Helen was pouting.

Amidst all the tearful goodbyes, Helen’s mood had devolved from reserved sorrow to outright embittered despair.

“Helen, dear, please cheer up.”

“I hate you!”

“You can’t act this way towards the young lord.”

“Go to hell!”

“Don’t speak that way to me.”

“Don’t speak to me at all! You horrid old rat!”

Lady Snowden was readying a backhand to strike the child, but the sheer banality of the insult took her aback. Her shocked visage turned towards Simon.

“Was this your doing?” she asked in wonder.

“Not me,” Simon replied, as confused as her.

The adults could not help but shake their heads. To see the shy, quiet, mild-mannered Helen throw such a tantrum was quite beyond their experience, or even imagination. It left them in a bit of a daze. Worse, they had no idea what might have triggered it.

“Turn here,” Simon indicated. Their little travel group took a right at a fork in the road. It led them off eastward, caught between the jungle on their left and a sheer cliff face on their right. A stream ran alongside the road.

“The old docks?” Sami asked.

“We’re simply staying at Club Skizalon for a few hours’ sleep. We’ll need to be up before sunrise,” Simon explained.

“Why’s that?”

“Increased monster activity in the Zabrael. There’s an armed patrol making  a run through the jungle at dawn. We’re going to tag along.”

“I see.”

Helen didn’t see and didn’t care. She crossed her arms and became obstinate. Aria firmed up when the younger girl began lagging behind.

“So help me... Clair, talk to your warren mate. Find out what’s bothering her.”

“Yes ma’am.”

The elder girl drifted back to her friend. They conversed for a moment. Helen shoved Clair away. Clair advanced again, spilling words of platitude. The process repeated several times. Helen hunched down beside the path and scrunched into a ball. Clair kneeled down beside her. The conversation continued in curt whispers. At last Clair helped Helen up and the slow march resumed.

“She’s upset her parents weren’t there to say goodbye.”

Aria scowled. Simon stood aback. He grabbed the lady by the hand and brought her behind a corner in the cliff. When they returned, the lady sported a rose red patch on her cheek. She was touching it gingerly.

“You’ll be punished for this, when you return,” she told Simon.

“Yours will come too,” Simon retorted.

“We’re there!” Sami shouted from the front of the pack.

The stream widened into an inlet, spilling out into ocean waters. The cliff face on their right rose to a great height. Nestled between the water and rock was Zabrael Docks.

The settlement was ancient, predating both Clefton Hold and Coran Tur, yet had seen little of their expansive growth. A two-story dock house stood in the middle of the estuary, with piers snaking outward to awaiting fishing boats. All the other buildings were embedded in the cliff face, nestled into every cranny and nook offered by the overhanging rock. Jungle-wood plank steps rose up to each entranceway.

“Up and to the right,” Simon gestured. They mounted two flights of stairs and then turned towards the largest edifice. A double door and three high windows loomed before them. Their guide let out a slight smirk. “Welcome to the Skiz.” He opened the door and beckoned them inside. The party entered in single file.

“Phew!” Helen immediately clenched her nose. The place reeked, not of any one odor but many combined. Alcohol, she could identify, spice, another. A pungent aroma that teased the high part of her nasal passage she guessed was perfume wafting from incense burners. The other half-dozen odors she had no idea as to their origin.

The place was filled with questionable characters befitting the aroma. They were, by and large, slender but tall, supine, and narrow-faced. Many were adorned with scavenged accessories and handmade jewelry. Their hair colors were unnatural, skewing towards pink and teal. Facial piercings were not uncommon, nor were tattoos, which ranged from trite mottos to artful floral patterns to violent weaponry and monster depictions. A few had conch-like tubes in hand, which they would put to their lips and puff out a stew of violet vapors.

“Fendrake,” the Lady muttered. And by the looks of it, the seaborne Fendrake. Which is to say their lower, rougher, crasser, more hostile caste.

During the day Club Skizalon is a trendy hangout for Clefton’s hipster youth. During the night it’s given over to the fishermen and sailors, primarily Fendrake, house of serpents. Wary, predatorial eyes followed their movement through the club. Asinine grins broke out across all who recognized their company. The Lady could not suppress a shudder.

A silken voice sung out from the upper recesses of the club.

“Your Lady, we are honored. And my good friend Simon. Welcome to the Skizalon. Pray what brings you to this... abode of wanton agony?”

Simon looked up the steps leading to the second story loft. Shadowy figures hovered around the overhanging balcony. “Is that you Rhea?” he called out.

“No, but I forgive you the mistake. We are twins after all.”

“Rizon,” Simon corrected his guess. One figure vaguely nodded its head.

“Twins?” Clair asked in a hushed whisper. The figure perked.

“I forgive your confusion, young one. Twins are such an absurdly rare phenomenon. The copulating couple must have a double bed unoccupied and ready, and then pray for the long odds of fetal fission during early pregnancy. Alas, such circumstances befell my father, Lord Nile Fendrake. And now here we are. Well, here am I. Riza has gone back to Tigbar. I hope I will suffice to give you company.”

Helen and Clair immediately bowed their heads on instinct, as did the other children. Even the offspring of a house lord were due a minimum of courtesy.

“We don’t need company, Rizon, just a place to nap. We’re headed to Gold Sand in the morning, with the patrol.”

“And what pray lies in Gold Sand?” Rizon asked.

“The road to Triss.”

The owner of the disembodied voice finally emerged, leaning lazily on the rail guard.

He was sharp-faced and sharp-eyed. His hair was slick and unnaturally dark, and sculpted into a spine-like crest. His attire, a loose tropical robe, was less gaudy than the other Fendrakes, and he also lacked their ostentatious body modifications. This was made up for by a prodigious amounts of tacky jewelry- rings, necklaces, bracelets, lapels, a jade crystal dangling from an earhook on his right ear. His eyes would normally be relaxed and wide open, but on hearing their destination they pressed themselves into a squint.

“I’m so very curious, for what purpose is a group of your kind travelling to Castle Triss? Ah.” He smiled, an expression that stretched unnaturally wide across his face. “Lady, my lady, forgive me, I do not presume to be shocked that you yourself have business at the tower. But the little ones- I will be so vulgar as to say that is no place for them to play around. They would be safer frolicking in the jungle.”

Aria spoke up.

“You are right. Still, that’s where we are going.”

“And?” Rizon inquired.

“And our purpose is none of your concern.”

The Lady knew this was a trap, one she had no choice but to fall into.

“Ah. So it is.” Rizon shrugged. “In that case, I would advise you to find lodgings somewhere else. We have no room here. As you can see.” Helen looked around. There was enough empty couches to accommodate their party.

“I’m sure you could make room.”

“Could? It’s in the realm of physical possibility. But I simply don’t want to.”

Aria sighed.

“Simon, get my seal.”

“Yes ma’am.”

“Rizon,” Aria said earnestly, “I would like to talk with you, privately.”

“Of course.” Rizon’s smile grew wider still. He waved for his company to vacate the loft. A parade of ungodly figures wound down from the staircase, dispersing to the corners of the club. Lady Aria ascended the steps. She greeted Rizon with a nod, and the pair dissapeared beyond sight.

“What’s going on?” Clair asked.

“She’s trading one of our few bargaining chips for a night’s lodging,” Simon answered.

“What’s our bargaining chip?”

“Favor with the Moonmage.”

“Okay?” Clair didn’t understand.

Helen did. Her shoulders drooped. For the sake of a night’s comfort and safety, the whole house would have to pay due to their landlord.

Later on, with the deep hour of the night setting in and the waxing moon shining out on the ocean, Helen sat on the steps of the loft. The lights had been extinguished. The other Snowden lay snoozing on the booth cushions. Most of the Fendrake below them had left, but not all. Some were passed out, voluntary victims of their drugs. Others were roiling in the throes of sex. Helen wrinkled her nose. Among the naked humping bodies was the Fendrake prince. Four women toyed for his attention until each had their fill. When at last the four had been put to sleep, the prince got up and pulled out a smoking pipe. He lit it, sucked in the vapor, and exhaled. The stench wafted up towards Helen, who clutched her nose shut.

Rizon noticed her awakened, annoyed countenance.

“You disapprove?”

“Stinks,” Helen mutedly growled.

Rizon paid her protest no mind. As if to deliberately irritate her, he strolled up to the foot of the steps and leaned on the railing, bringing the stench that much closer.

Helen whined. Rizon contentedly enjoyed his smoke until the herb was entirely consumed, and only then extinguished the pipe. The girl frowned at him insistently, then spoke up.

“How do you get away with that?”

“With what? This?” Rizon raised the pipe.

“All of that.” She indicated his face. “God says you’re not allowed to use drugs.”

Rizon giggled.

“God _says_ \- but what does he _do_? Nothing. He is not very particular in enforcing it. Not against us Fendrake, at least. I would happily quit if the divine ever actually threatened to punish us.”

“Lady Aria says he is punishing you, for all your nasty habits.”

“I’ve heard that interpretation. It’s why my kin are persona non grata here on the mainland, practically banished to that cramped refuse pile of an island. But make no mistake. It was not God’s doing. It’s mortals who are persecuting us. The Endingways and the Dustdays and the Stonesteps and all their puritanical judgments. I would expect your kind to have some sympathy.”

Helen wrinkled her nose.

“We’re perverts but nothing more. You’re perverted in all the ways that having nothing to do with love.” She fidgeted.

“I can hear that- ah, what is that? A hint of jealousy in your condemnation,” Rizon noted.

“No one likes you, but at least they respect you. Fendrake come in to Coran Tur and we have to be polite, hold you a feast, clean up after your icky room parties. You’re much worse than us, in every way- even your sex is more offensive! We’d never do it out in the open like you. But we’re still beneath you. Still have no place of our own. Still have to obey every stupid whim of any ole house lord. What makes us different, huh? Why isn’t God punishing you? Why aren’t the houses punishing you?”

Helen tucked herself into a fetal posture.

Rizon stared smugly at her.

“Because we’re not pedophiles.”

Rizon ascended the steps. Helen tensed up, preparing for some kind of assault, but the man took an unassuming seat beside her.

“Don’t be nervous. Your body disgusts me, I would never take it, even if offered.”

Helen hardly took that as reassurance.

“We’re not so different, really. Sexual deviants, but a lust based on familiarity and intimacy. You have warrens, we have harems. We’re both the dredges of society, wards taken under the protective wing of a powerful but thoroughly insane matriarch. You understand the Moonmage’s position, don’t you?”

“Nnn.” Helen buried her face into her forearm.

“They only tolerate our behavior because they themselves don’t care about sex. To them, it’s as natural and unremarkable as defecating. To be done when necessary. They must think us rather constipated, really.”

Helen looked away, embarrassed. Rizon tilted his head, waiting for reply. None came. He went on.

“You think you suffer and we don’t?”

“Mmm.”

“Then, would you care for a history lesson?” he asked.

“Sure.”

“I don’t know your story. You Snowden, that is. I assume it’s your habit of being too young when you first start fucking, that is why all the universe seems aligned against you. I could be wrong. But I do know our story. Look out the window.”

“Huh?” Helen glanced up. “I don’t see anything.”

“Look harder. It’s there. In the sky.”

Helen squinted. “Where are the stars?”

A large, blocky patch of pitch darkness stood out among the star-filled canopy of the night sky. Far out on the moonlit ocean, a similarly blocky shadow lay. There was something there, hovering over the waves.

“It’s Zabrael.”

“The tower,” Helen realized.

“Yes, the Tower of Envy. For which the jungle and the desert and the river and the docks are all named. Zabrael, _our_ Zabrael. Denied to us.”

Rizon let out a dry, rasping laugh.

“That old dock house is one of the oldest structures in the world. Older than Coran Tur. Older than Gold Sand’s City Hall, or even the famed Ecteren Inn.”

“Older than Castle Triss?” Helen asked.

“Not that old,” Rizon said. “As long as it’s been there, Fendrake have occupied it, free to stare wantonly up into the sky at a tower we have never stepped foot upon.” He sighed. “God promised each sin a tower, a place all their own, free to indulge in their folly, or else, learn to temper it with its respective virtue. Sounds lovely, doesn’t it? But God is a fickle, lazy bastard. He has only finished two towers. Triss was first, and though it took eons, the Prides eventually got to occupy it. Then it was our turn. Zabrael, the Hanging Gardens, a magnificence to surpass all! Or so he said. But God reneged, stopped midway, and went to work on other projects- always promising to finish Zabrael. And so we waited. And so he procrastinated. And so we’ve been tantalized and tortured. _For one thousand years_.”

Helen’s eyes briefly widened, but then relaxed.

“You’re not the only ones,” she said. “ _When Coran Tur is done_ ,” she recited like a mantra.

“I am aware. Yet I argue, who has waited longest? And most patiently? And all those other projects God abandons halfway through, at the very least, they are traversable. Coran Tur was occupied for half a millennia before it was “finished”. Zabrael is a few dozen meters above the ocean, with no way of accessing it. If we could just have the stairway God promised... but it seems to be his intention to tease us, for eternity. So we come to your question at last. Why does God not punish us for our indulgences? Perhaps your lady is right, he already is, by denying us our home. Or as my father thinks, he is punishing us for no moral purpose, and our disregard for his commandments are our symbolic, righteous protest. Who knows. I think it could be both. A mutual understanding. Our tattoos do not itch, our piercings do not burn, our pipes do not make us sick. An allowance for our suffering.”

Helen let out a disapproving guffaw.

“You have an objection?”

“God would build your stairway, if you ever gave up the bad habits he doesn’t like.”

“Clever girl. But hypocritical. You are most likely correct, but what does that say about your own situation?”

Helen got up and retreated towards the couch cushion. She flopped in between Clair and Sami, snuggling in tight. She made no effort to respond to his taunt. Rizon shrugged, grinned, and pulled out another wad of smoking weed. He went to light it, paused, and set the match down.

“I don’t envy them at all,” he said to himself.

 


	14. The Road to Gold Sand River

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The Zabrael transit:  
> A road that crosses the Zabrael Desert and Zabrael Jungle to link the major population centers of the South and Central regions. A small unfinished fort stands at the midway point.

“Assume formation. Follow my commands, do not deviate. Let’s go.”

The first rays of the morning sun beamed straight down the line of the valley. Its golden touch had begun gracing the tips of the Clefton Ridge to the south. Grass-covered hills climbed ever farther and ever higher, until they culminated into the three great southern peaks: Mt. Somnor, Mt. Claro, Mt. Eikden. There, nestled between the peaks, its quartz towers glittering in the dawnlight, stood Coran Tur. Helen could just make it out from this distance. A wave of forlorn sadness crept into her heart.

The only home she had ever known. Her loving parents and mates. Gone. Left behind. Never to be seen again? She didn’t know.

“And march!”

The army captain shouted, and the convoy got underway. Helen was forced forward by the hand of Simon. Before them loomed a wall of verdant shadow, into which their party plunged. Zabrael Jungle quickly closed in around them.

Six soldiers led the way down the road. Four took the back, including the captain. They bracketed the civilian contingent between them like the carts of a train. The Snowdens were not the only ones undertaking the journey. They were joined by merchants from Coran Tur and Clefton Hold, loaded with goods and headed for the rich markets of Gold Sand River. Some had horses for carrying heavy loads, others hefted enormous backpacks, still others simply carried piles of empty bags in their arms. For the most part the traders seemed upbeat, even jovial. Conversation was ceaseless and animated. They were used to this journey and had no fear of it. It helped put Helen at ease.

“It’s not that dangerous,” Simon told her. “We’ll get through it in an hour. This is more of a precaution, because of the activity coming from the desert.”

Helen nodded.

Her nerves were helped again when the road cut into the earth, then climbed into an elevated walkway. There was no point at which the cobblestone was level with the surrounding terrain, although the sheer density of vegetation mostly made that a moot point. Still, every sign seemed to indicate the danger was overstated. Indeed, when a monster did appear the soldiers didn’t even bother stopping to confront it.

“That’s a monster?” Clair asked.

“Yes.”

“But it’s so... puny.”

The creature in question was some cross of a lizard and snake, with exaggeratedly large, bulging eyes, only two limbs on the left side of its body, and a goofy, toothy grin. It lay still beneath the walkway, silently watching the humans march by.

“Don’t think for a second it wouldn’t kill you,” Simon warned. “But that said, don’t worry too much. That’s a Monoboa, a tier one, not very dangerous. We’ll be safe up here.”

“I heard the jungle is one of the most dangerous places in the world,” Clair said.

“Sort of.”

One of the soldiers overheard her.

“That don’t make it especially dangerous, miss.” He pointed up ahead. “Watch yourself, stupid people die here all the time.”

A warm glow came from between the trees. Helen’s skin was prickled by the touch of heat. Both sensations increased in intensity as they walked on. Her senses stood aback when she realized the source. The road went overtop an open lava pit.

“This is more dangerous than any monster living in the jungle. Keep to the center, mind your balance. Hey you asses! That’s you too! Double for you greedster with the overloaded pack! One little stumble and you’re toast, got it? As for monsters, there’s no real harm left. The King’s been leading extermination parties all over the Nearlands. It shouldn’t be long before we clear out everything for good.”

Helen tilted her head.

“I don’t understand, if this wasn’t all that dangerous, why did we have to wait for the soldiers?” Helen asked Simon.

“Just a precaution,” he answered. “The army isn’t always that thorough.”

Helen didn’t like that answer. She clung to Clair, who clung to Simon.

The path plunged through the dense underbrush, mostly straight ahead. Wimba trees enclosed all around them, their canopies shrouding the road. Unseen creatures scampered through the branches above them, occasionally knocking twigs, leaves, fruit, or even droppings down upon them. Bird calls unlike Helen had ever heard rebounded from one side of the foliage to the other. The jungle was very much alive and imposing its presence on them. It was unnerving. But thankfully, it was also benign. Nothing of note happened while they made their way through to the other side.

“Ah!” The females let out a cry of relief. “There it is!” The trees grew thinner and light began streaming in from up ahead. The emerald wall splintered, giving way to glimpses of gold. The temperature had been quite warm throughout, and also very humid, but the shade had comfortably tempered it. That was no longer so, as waves of dry heat began billowing upon them.

“So hot!”

“It’s the desert.”

“It’s something on the road?” Cory pointed ahead. The soldiers up front were already attentive, hands on hilts.

A figure was coming at them, fast. Details came into focus as it got closer- human-sized, then human shaped, then positively identified as a human. It was a woman in military uniform, of Dustday style. She ran straight past the forward guard, shouting something at them as she went. They jumped into action, hustling the merchants forward, getting everyone to move forward, and fast.

“Go go go! Run!” she cried to the Snowdens. Then she was at the captain’s feet, kneeling and exhausted. A hushed and hurried conversation that lasted four sentences later, and the captain was screaming out orders.

“All men to the front! Charge! Charge now! Get out and form wall a on the north flank! Civilians forward! March fast! Drop your goods if you can’t keep up!”

“Why forward?” Helen asked. Simon ignored her and sprinted to the front as well. The soldiers had formed a phalanx. Three had shields and stood up front. Those with swords and spears grouped behind them. Simon, rather than huddle in behind them, jumped off the road and onto the vegetation. He nimbly skipped along the roots and branches, knocking an arrow to his bow as he went.

“Snowden!” the captain yelled.

“Sir!”

“Run ahead! Get to the fort! Scout it out!”

“Yes sir!” Simon shouldered his bow and sprinted headlong ahead of the convoy.

Helen and the other girls watched him disappear. Clair whined in fear.

“Why’d he leave us?!”

“He has to,” Helen said.

“I don’t want him to go! This is unfair. This isn’t what you promised!” Clair’s protest was directed to the Lady. Aria’s response was to push the young woman forward, urging her to go faster.

As a servant of the Lady of House Snowden, Simon’s prime loyalty was to his matriarch. In times of crisis, however, that duty was superseded by his role as an enlisted soldier of the Royal Army. Besides, Aria knew better than to question the tactical judgment of an experienced officer of the Nearland Patrol. Simon was where he needed to be to protect them all.

The convoy emerged from the jungle. The wimpa trees abruptly ended and they were faced with the searing sun and miles of scorching sand.

“Up! You’ve got time!” A primitive stonebrick bastion rose just off the road to their left. Stairs led up to a reinforced doorway, currently open. Simon was perched on its porch, eyeing the desert, bow knocked.

The merchants and Snowdens hustled up the steps and into the belly of the fort. The soldiers barreled in after them. Simon came in last. A lever was drawn down and the doors slammed shut. Everyone held their breath. Seconds passed.

“How far?” the captain asked.

“A minute,” Simon answered. Helen silently counted off a minute in her head, having no idea what it was even for. She got to sixty, then eighty, then at ninety-two:

BANG!

The doors rattled under an impact. A screech hissed out from beyond. It was like a razor drawn over the eardrums, painful and hideous. The cry eventually died, but was soon followed by more rattling upon the door. It sounded like knives being scraped along its outer surface.

Sami clung to Nile, Lily clung to Cory, and Lady Aria was crumpled into a fetal posture. Simon was nowhere to be seen. The girls had no one to turn to. The interior of the fort was overcrowded, bodies were pressed tight against one another. Helen wanted the comfort of human touch, but not from strangers. She looked for Simon, but couldn’t find him. She also noticed that most of the soldiers had vanished as well, leaving only a pair flanking the door, weapons drawn.

“Up there?” Clair said, noticing a stairwell.

The girls climbed it and emerged into the desert sun. The second floor of the fort was missing, another one of God’s unfinished projects. A dozen or so soldiers milled around the outer edges, most crowded against the front.

“I can’t get a good shot.”

“Don’t fall over trying to get one.”

“It’s really aggressive.”

“It won’t break the doors.”

“Can it get through the wood walls though?”

“Nah, that’s dark oak.”

“Hold tight. We’re going to wait it out,” the captain declared.

Helen spotted Simon, manning one of the corners. She snuck her way over to him.

“Helen! Clair!” he said.

“What’s going on? What is it? Everyone is scared.”

“It’s a monster. Get back downstairs.”

“No. I don’t feel safe down there.”

The other soldiers spotted the girls, but none protested. It was far too crowded on the first floor, and a few merchants had the same idea to come up. There really wasn’t a point being up or down, the danger was the same.

Helen crept over towards the edge, shaking.

“What are you doing?”

“I want a look.”

“Fine. Here.” Simon guided her body low to the ground. She crept forward on her belly, until her head cleared the edge. She saw the desert below, the road, the jungle, and finally the stairway leading up to porch and doorway. Then...

“It’s called a Dune Mantis. It’s a tier two, extremely dangerous,” Simon explained.

Helen shivered.

It was instantly clear this was no beast or benign creature. It was shaped wrong, it was shaded wrong, it moved wrong, it was wrong in all the ways a bear or rabbit or deer was right. This _thing_ was unnatural. An alien. Most certainly- a monster.

It was a iridescent black, a shiny carapace reminiscent of a beetle’s shell. The body was segmented, unevenly, like an insect but not in a definite abdomen-thorax-head order. There seemed to be multiple interconnected thoraxes, but it was difficult to tell through the many skittering limbs. Maybe half (maybe, there was no counting) of the limbs were anchored to the porch. The rest were busy flailing at the door. Scythe blades emerged and vanished like switchblades from its forelimbs. Each time it cut across the metal door an ear-piercing screech split the air. What truly unsettled Helen, however, was the lack of anything that resembled a head. It was difficult to think this thing was even a living being and not an automated murder machine.

Quite suddenly, the creature stiffened, attentive. Its body swiveled and pointed its axis directly at Helen. There was no mouth nor eyes nor face, but it still felt like it was locked onto her presence.

She slowly withdrew her head.

“I... ugh...” she held her hands to her mouth to stifle a scream. “It has no head.”

“Yeah. That’s right. It has mouths on its left and right abdomens, but no head and no brain.” Simon hunched over her back and wrapped his arms around her.

“Can it get in?” she asked.

“No.”

“Can it climb?”

“No. We’re safe up here.”

“Are you sure?”

“Yes. It’s only a tier two. We have fourteen soldiers here.”

Helen slumped to the ground. She looked around, but found Clair missing. Simon sensed her next question.

“She went back downstairs, while you were looking.”

“Ah.”

Helen took in a deep breath.

“You, ah, mentioned that earlier. Tiers. What does that mean?”

“It’s the monster’s threat level. Tier one is the lowest. A single soldier should be able to kill a tier one without danger. Then each tier up the number of soldiers needed is multiplied by ten.”

“One soldier, ten soldiers, one hundred soldiers,” Helen said, nodding. Simon nodded in affirmation. Her eyes widened with shock realization. “I heard you talk about tier _four_. That’s one thousand soldiers. There isn’t one thousand _people_ in the whole south region. Do monsters like that... really exist?”

Simon smirked. “Yep. But they’re very rare, and they only live in the Farlands. Nobody has seen one in centuries.”

Simon squatted down beside the edge. He raised his bow, knocked an arrow, drew, and fired. An enraged shriek followed.

“Kk. Fuck.” He gave Helen a wan smile. “We’ve got enough soldiers, but even for a tier two, those things are dangerous in close quarters. They can dismember a man in full plate armor. It’s hard to hit their weak spot with arrows too. So, we kinda just have to wait for it get tired.”

His words weren’t the most encouraging, but the way Simon talked, so nonchalant and casually, put Helen at ease.

“You sound like you’re having fun.”

“Oh I am.” Simon twitched, then suddenly let loose another arrow. A husky, unearthly cry followed. “Got ya ya shit!” he shouted. The soldiers let out a cheer. The monster responded to the injury with renewed fury upon the door. Simon settled back down, then noticed Helen’s alarmed face. “Oh. Sorry for that. There’s a little gap between the upper sheath and its belly armor, gets exposed when its limbs are full extended. Have to take the shot when I can.”

Helen had covered her ears again, and only slowly lowered them.

“You like fighting, don’t you?”

“Monsters, yeah.” Simon grinned. “They’re evil to the core and will kill you on sight. They don’t hesitate and they have zero mercy. The only thing stopping a monster from murdering you is if it physically can’t.” Simon gave a nod in the Dune Mantis’ direction. “It’s satisfying, to me, to end that kind of existence.”

“But it’s risky. Dangerous. Aren’t you ever afraid?”

“Sure. Sometimes. Not enough to stop me. Monsters can be scary, but only so much, since they’re pretty simple as far as adversaries go. Learn their weakness, hone your strength, and killing them is just a matter of execution. Nothing to be afraid of.”

“Ah. Then what kind of adversary is scary to you?” Helen asked.

“Humans,” Simon said quietly.

After an hour of futile assault on the metal doors and taking three arrows to its flesh, the Dune Mantis gave up and slunk back into the desert. The soldiers ascertained it had really left then gave the all clear. The convoy gathered together once more.

“Captain Huxley.” Simon saluted.

“Scout.” The captain saluted him back.

“They’re leaving?” Clair asked, watching the soldiers march back towards the jungle.

“We’re safe now.” Simon pointed to the road up ahead. It rose up into a wall and covered rampart, then continued on due north as far as the eye could see. On the east side was dense jungle, on the west side the desert stretched to the horizon. The road-wall acted as a border between the two regions.

“That’s the Royal Road. It’s fortified, we can stroll atop it all the way to Gold Sand River.”

“Are you sure it’s safe?”

“Most monsters can’t really climb, so yeah. The desert’s a hotbed for monsters, but once we get past that, it’s all green hill territory, no real monster activity to speak of. We’re safe. From the monsters, at least.” Simon motioned for the Snowdens to move. Some of the merchants were already making their way up the Royal Road’s steps. As they trotted along, Simon pointed out monsters and beasts crawling along the desert sands, reciting their rankings and unique abilities.

It was near sunset when they finally reached Gold Sand River.

“Wow.”

Helen and Clair stopped in their tracks. Mouths hung agape.

The world’s greatest city rose before them.


	15. The Builder

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Gold Sand River, the desert metropolis.

The girls gawked at the view before them.

As did Lady Aria.

Simon addressed her.

“What’s the matter ma’am?”

“That wasn’t here last month.”

The cityscape was composed of a multitude of sandstone buildings, from small single resident housing to massive multipurpose complexes, but there was one that towered over all the rest. Truly, it was a literal mountain of architecture, a gargantuan edifice of square floors and glass facades rising higher, higher, and higher until the children craned their necks skyward to make out its top. Nor did the comparison end at its sheer size: the structure was also as irregular, fat, lumpy, and layered as a rock strata. The rusty tan of sandstone was predominant, but there were also inlays of burnt orange and imperial blue, the official colors of Gold Sand River.

“What the...”

Helen, Clair, Sami, Lily, Nile, and Cory were all stunned by the massive wonder. To them it was all new and unknown, something to gawk at as tourists. To Simon and Aria, it was both new _and_ meaningful.

“Maybe this is what they called the meeting for,” Aria muttered. “I can’t believe he’s finally building it.”

“Is it a new tower?” Simon asked.

“No,” she shook her head. “That’s Dustday Manor.”

“A manor?!”

The children had no comprehension. Helen silently wondered why her Lady was becoming so unsettled over this new sight. Worry crept into the group.

“Let’s go see what it’s about.”

They walked into the city proper, winding their way through alleys and streets. It was crowded, and the roads were narrow and twisted. The houses were small and very basic in features. Compared to Coran Tur, the quality of construction was poor. God clearly had a “quantity over quality” philosophy when expanding Gold Sand.

“Left,” Aria said, guiding them through the Old Town neighborhood.

“Hey Simon,” Clair asked. “Have you ever been to Gold Sand?”

“Once. When I enlisted in the army, they held the induction ceremony in Centerpoint.”

“Was it always like this?” she followed up.

“Well it’s always been sprawling and crowded, but _that_ didn’t exist,” he answered.

“I guess that’s where we’re headed.”

“Yep.”

“It’s not finished,” Aria noted. Her eyes were fixed at the top of the structure. She was right- there were obvious gaps in the construction, beams, floors, and walls that hung in midair with no obvious support, missing roof segments, and so forth.

In due time they found their way to a fancy (by Gold Sand standards) plaza and set of steps. These led to a wide porch and set of cornered doors, apparently the front entrance of the manor. Aria led them inside. They entered a spacious foyer with curious floor work and hallways leading to further large chambers in two directions. Several guards interdicted any further advance.

“State your name and business.”

“I am Lady Aria Snowden. My business is the Council of House Lords. Let me pass.”

The guards eyed her, then the group surrounding her.

“I need to speak to my superior,” the guard said.

“Excuse me? I am a Lady, let me pass.”

The guard shrugged.

“Uh... Yeah, well, if you really are the Lady of the House, you’re free to go wherever. But they can’t go any further.” The guard pointed at the rest of the Snowdens.

“They are my servants, of course-“

“You’re Snowden. Cap’n!”

Another guard walked up, wearing heavier armor and more auspicious badges.

“Captain Waldo Dustday, Ma’am.” The captain gave her a good look over and nodded. “And so you are the Lady, they’ve been expecting you.”

“And my entourage?” she inquired.

“By order of the Lady Dustday, no Snowden is to step foot in Dustday Manor. Excluding yourself, of course.”

“But why?”

The captain wrinkled his nose. The other guards chuckled.

“New beds. Fresh and unowned. Wouldn’t want any of you fuckers loading them with your babies. They’re being held for Dustday families.”

The Snowdens stood aback. Lady Aria bit back tears of indignation.

“You think so little of us, that we’d sleep on your precious beds?” she said in even, terse words.

“Think? I _know_. You lot be fucking in seconds if we turned our backs right here and now.”

“You-“ Aria took a deep breath and choked a curse back down her throat. “This insolence could only stand against _our_ house. The Moonmage-”

“Oh come on, Ma’am. You know it’s the damn truth. We got to take every precaution, it’s our future at stake. You lot can come back and sightsee when the beds are claimed.”

Lady Aria took a moment to calm her anger. Her shivers of rage ceased. The same could not be said of Simon.

“Can I show them the council chamber, at least?” Aria asked.

“Eh? Eh- that’s fine. Horatio, show em the chamber and then shoo the peasants out.”

The guard and the Lady jointly led their group to a nearby chamber, this one very tall and prominent. One entire wall was made up of a glazed terracotta mosaic featuring a map of Gold Sand River. Another wall used patchwork masonry to represent the world map. A u-shaped table was surrounded by high-backed chairs, all of it made of expensive quartz.

“This is the City Council Chamber. The heads of the twelve Houses will be meeting here soon.”

Aria looked it over. Clair and the others did so as well. Helen tilted her head, more interested in Aria’s curious glances.

“It’s not new. This part of the manor is City Hall, it’s been standing since prehistory. God always said he would build Dustday Manor on top of City Hall- but now, that’s like saying I was built on top of my pinky toe.”

“Ma’am,” Helen said. “You seem upset. It’s just a big building, right?”

Aria leaned down to talk to her face to face.

“Dear, you know humans can’t build buildings. Only God.”

“Right, our buildings would crumble overnight.”

“So that means, whenever God gifts us a building, he’s giving us shelter. New beds for new families. New industries and stores, roads, farms, and all the other things necessary for an economy. Do you get it?”

Helen shook her head.

“Buildings mean power. Raw economic power. And God just gave one giant heap of power to House Dustday. This is going to change the global balance.”

Helen reflected on her words. It seemed strange, even a little overdramatic, until she began connecting the logic to their own situation.

“Because God built a loom in Thill, we have to go to Triss and make Lord Loft happy.”

“Yes. That’s right.”

Helen’s gut sank. A little textile mill in a faraway city meant she had to give her body and servitude to a young man she had never met. It made sense, then, that Lady Aria was worried. What kind of far flung consequences, what other conflicts and obligations would such a massive construction inflict on their house?

“Okay, you’ve seen enough. Time to go.”

“Where to?”

“Anywhere but here,” the guard warned.

Aria gave each member a hug and kiss on the lips. For Simon, the kiss had a little extra. The Dustday guard saw this and gagged in disgust. Aria shot him a snide look- ‘ _If you’re going to treat us that way, watch and be jealous_ ’.

“There’s a place called Riverbed Complex. It has a shopping mall, they sell almost anything you can imagine. Perhaps you’d like to go there. Nile, Lily, I know you’ll enjoy it.”

The aforementioned Snowdens perked up.

“It’s got a clothing shop with a nice fabric section. They import all kinds of materials and patterns-“ and that was enough. The pair of expert tailors were begging to get going. Simon led the group back into the streets.

“We’re going to go sight see,” Clair announced.

“Ah! Hey wait, you guys! Clair, no! Don’t get lo-“ but Simon was borne away by the overexcited sewing-fanatics.

Clair dragged Helen out into a plaza jam-packed with people of all houses.

“You don’t want to go shopping?” Helen asked.

“Nah, I want to try to get a peep at Dustday Manor,” Clair said.

“Ah. Me too. But the guards- you heard what Aria said about the Dustdays.”

“Hmm. You’re right.” Clair scratched her chin in thought. The prospect of being scolded by soldiers, or worse, kept her impulsive thrill-seeking at bay. Still, it was hard. Casually listening to the crowd around them teased out tantalizing details.

“The cook’s aren’t very experienced yet.”

“Well give them time. It’s been, like, two weeks since the restaurant opened.”

“What’s it called again? The Gloridae?”

“No that’s the hotel. It’s the Bene Stelle. And it’s going to be the class of the world, from what I hear about their kitchen.”

“Yeah yeah, but in the meantime, pool parties! I’ve got everyone lined up, we’ll throw a bash for May’s birthday.”

“Ah, oh yeah! The curiosity shop just opened too, let’s look for a present there.”

Helen and Clair fidgeted. It all _sounded_ spectacular. But they couldn’t go near it.

“Hmm?”

“Say, you know, I heard there were new beds too! Any idea when they’re going to be filled up?” Clair casually inserted herself into the gossip, as she was wont, and the other women obliged. Helen was left to her own devices.

“Don’t know,” one woman said. “The Builder hasn’t been working the last couple of days.”

Helen ignored them, her interest caught by a sudden, almost imperceptible flash coming off the roof several buildings. It was in the direction opposite the manor, so she thought it wouldn’t be too much trouble to investigate.

She squeezed through the crowd until found herself staring at a large statue of the Griffin raised on a dais. The flashes were a little stronger, and accompanied by distant thudding noises. The origin was behind the statue, but there was no roadway leading around it. She found a narrow alley aside the dais that led to her goal, so jumped down and followed it. It was damp and the ground was overgrown with grass and weeds. She slogged through it and made it out into the open.

She had reached the outer edges of Gold Sand River, where the desert met the green hills of Bowline Ridge. There were no roads here, and the whole of the city stretched behind her. But before her- something was happening.

“Ah! Huh?!”

Helen blinked.

Then rubbed her eyes.

There was something wrong with her vision, she thought. It was all messed up. She turned away and stared at the back of the statue and the Riverbed Complex. No, no, they looked normal. It wasn’t her eyes, it was whatever she was trying to look at. She tried again, this time slowly tilting her head and squinting her eyes rather than stare at it dead-on.

It was like looking at the sun. Or a maze of non-Euclidian geometry. Or the back of one’s eyelids. Or at a waterfall. Or... well, to be truthful, it wasn’t like anything Helen could imagine, let alone describe. The sight pressed down upon her conscious, telling her “This isn’t real”.

But somehow, it was there.

The visage of reality had been peeled away, and all the fine details were condensed, all the form and shapes had been compacted and simplified, until the entirety of the world- the entire universe- was manifested as cubes.

Trees were cubes. Grass was cubes. Fences were cubes. Stone and dirt hills were neatly divided into three dimensional squares. Walls were built of precisely divided cubic units. It was as if the messy, granular, finely interwoven fabric of nature was reduced to a far simpler, grid-aligned substance. Like- like staring at the individual pixels of a redstone video.

And in that cubic chaos, a single figure flitted back and forth at impossible speeds, sometimes diving straight through the terrain like a ghost. Everywhere it went, the world changed, cubes appeared out of thin air, and stack atop one another in neat and ordered fashion. Individual cubes clumped together to form shapes, and then, though it was difficult to tell at such abstracted granularity, the shapes took meaningful form.

Stairs. Walls. Doorway. Doors. Windows. Balcony. Lights. Floor. Landing. Column. Furniture, lamps, tables, chairs, ovens, wash basins. A whole house. A very large house, actually. Not of the mammoth proportions of the Dustday manor, but certainly sizable, larger than any single residence in Coran Tur. It was not of the same sandstone makeup as the rest of Gold Sand either, but of gleaming white marble. This was... some sort of mansion taking shape.

Which meant this figure, this boxy humanoid rummaging back and forth plunking material into place-

It stopped for but a moment, turned, and looked dead-on at the young woman.

“Helen,” it said. “God is watching you.” Then it went back to its work, erecting higher and higher frames of marble and filling in the space with colored glass.

Even as Helen stumbled away, she forgot what the figure looked like. In fact, she couldn’t remember what any of that bizarre vision had looked like, exactly. No definite picture remained in her memory, just the fact of its existence.

She stumbled into Clair in the plaza, and then dragged her in a beeline towards their arranged meeting space. There she told Simon what she had experienced. He stared incredulously at her. Without answering, he raced off, towards the location of the incident. Helen and company followed.

“What did you tell him?” Clair asked, but Helen waved her down.

When they returned to the construction site, the window into the cuboid world had vanished. Yet the product of the labors remained- a modern, experimental looking residence made of stacked rectangular frames of marble and glass stood on the grassy slope. By the looks of it, the exterior was already completed. A sign was raised on the lawn before it.

‘Noon House’ it read.

Under the title, more words were scrawled in small blocky print.

‘Be back to finish the inside tomorrow.’

“It’s gone,” Simon muttered. He then took in the sight of the new structure and whistled.

“What was that?” Helen asked.

“Look at it- wow. Helen, I’m so damn sorry, we deserve to live in a place like this. It’s probably the biggest, nicest house outside the House manors. Noon House, huh? I’m so jealous.”

“Simon!”

“What?”

“That thing,” Helen said. “Flying around like a ghost. What the heck was that?”

“Oh. You actually saw it. That’s rare.” Simon scratched the back of his head, trying to figure out how to explain it. Helen stared at him, curiosity and dread intermixing and rising.

“That was the Builder,” Simon explained.

“The... what?”

“The Builder. The thing that builds. The spirit that comes down and constructs everything for us. That’s it. The weird vision you saw- I talked with some professors. They say it’s the real universe, with the nice mortal-friendly interface stripped away and just the fundamental laws of nature laid out bare.” Simon struggled to remember the lesson, even knocking his head. “Like, the Second Law is built into the background of the universe. In order to make something that doesn’t fall apart, the background itself has to be modified, so the Builder makes a hole and applies the changes.”

“So you mean... that was...” Helen was almost at a loss for words. Simon picked up on her meaning.

“God?”

She nodded.

“Not exactly. But probably the closest we mortals will ever get to him. The Builder isn’t God, more like God’s servant, or maybe his hand? An avatar? I don’t think the professors ever agreed on an exact relationship.”

Helen sat down on a ledge.

She put her hands to her face.

“God is real,” she said.

“Of course,” Simon said.

“Duh,” Clair added.

“I mean, now he’s real _to me_. I saw something divine. All the stories and church tales, but those weren’t tangible. This is... It’s a little shocking, and I don’t really understand it,” Helen said.

“That’s to be expected.”

Helen grasped her head tighter and clenched her eyes shut.

She hadn’t told Simon that the Builder spoke to her.

In her mind, she repeated its words.

‘God is watching you’.

What the hell did that mean?!

 


End file.
